Dust to Dust
by Kerberos314
Summary: Another one bites the dust, huh? Another corpse to toss in the ground, cold, old, forgotten. Another round in the chamber, stacked up one after the other in menacing order- better than wasting away idle. Flash! Bang! A scream: "USE ME"!
1. Archean

**Updated 11/28/2018**

* * *

Another one bites the dust, huh? Another corpse to toss in the ground, cold, old, forgotten. Another round in the chamber, stacked up one after the other in menacing order- better than wasting away idle. Flash! Bang! A scream: "USE ME"!

* * *

"Over here! Quickly!" An orange glow pierces the primordial darkness, porous limestone walls drinking in the echoes of a sound long since forgotten. "Come on! There's a cave, they won't be able to reach us in here!"

Flame enters first, followed by a leather-coated arm as the armored man squeezes himself sideways through the crag, jagged rock carving deep scratches into his breastplate.

They go unnoticed alongside the ones already there.

"One at a time! It opens up in here!" Boots slosh through puddles as he stumbles gracelessly into the open space. He turns back as another arm gropes aimlessly out of the cranny, latches on and pulls with deliberate urgency.

Like a chain passed through the eye of a needle, somehow, one by one bodies spill into the surprisingly large cavern and uncoil in the room provided, groaning from the stress.

"Damn those monsters!" The single torch does nothing to illuminate the speaker, only showing the sunken eyes and hollow faces of the survivors who are too weary to even contemplate anger.

"How many do we have?" Artificial light reveals a baker's dozen, young and old, bearded and clean-shaven faces all looking away from the fire and all with something dark caked over them to obscure the disillusionment underneath. Sopping wet hair hangs their heads low in defeat as they lean against the moist rock of the cavern.

"That's all?" The bearded man with the torch whispers to himself, not allowing his own defeat to permeate in that enclosed space. "What about supplies? What do we have left?"

Quiet searching reveals little: a few skeins of wine, a dozen parcels of jerky, a few pocketfulls of corn and another pitch-soaked stave which they quickly relight. At least they will not have to worry about water, if the roaring deluge outside the cave is any indication.

Even as this he thinks this, another kind of roar penetrates their stony shelter and sends shivers up through the floors and into their spines.

"Don't worry about it, there is no way they can reach us." Though he does worry, knowing that this assurance will do little if those ravenous creatures decide otherwise. And the survivors of their caravan each know this, so he wonders why he even bothers.

"This cave extends quite some ways. I'm going to see if there is another entrance."

He does so because he must keep up the appearance of strength, even if it is all an act and his own hope died with his wife many years ago. The monsters will win, as they always have.

Nodding to the other torchbearer, he sets off down the passageway, the rattling of his plate armor slowly disappearing into the darkness and the warmth of the flame snuffed out by the damp coldness.

What starts out as a cathedral-like ceiling quickly descends into little more than a tunnel. First he stoops, then gets on all fours, finally crawling, dragging himself on his armored stomach with torch clasped precariously in his mouth. It seems little hope that there is an alternative pathway out, and that if it comes to it, this place will be their tomb. But he remembers the almost invisible entrance to the complex, and so presses on with that modicum of hope in mind.

At last, there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

The way in had been gradual, cavernous mouth swallowing the group up. Now he himself pushed further into the knotted bowls of the earth. Emergence was all at once, abruptly spitting him out into another open space.

Although, covered from head to toe in brown and feeling distinctly ragged and filthy, he was more tempted to think that he had come out the other end.

Having long since swallowed his dignity the moment he resigned his purple cowl and declared himself his own man, the first in the Arc line, he stood up without another moment's hesitation and surveyed the chamber he found himself in.

While not the exit he had perhaps hoped for, what he discovered was beyond his wildest dreams.

Dull limestone had given way to a pantheon of color as his torchlight danced and sparkled in a million crystal faces. Each step he took shifted that kaleidoscope into a dizzying swirl, pleochroic light winking sultrily at him and begging him to lie down beside it, underneath that eternal rainbow.

It was only his awe and curiosity which kept him moving forward, shuffling steps deadened by the whispers of the stone calling out to him. It wasn't long until he noticed that there was an internal brilliance to these rocks. His torch seemed so dull in comparison that it fell by his heels as he trekked ever deeper.

The gentle whispers became a hum, the hum became a drone, the drone a din, and finally he recognized one above the others calling out to him from the far wall. Trying to fight it with that same strength he had shown previously proved useless as its pull was too incessant, overshadowing his resigned sense of duty.

He fell to his knees in front of that wall, a singularly large hexagonal crystal facing out towards him like a finger which he was already wrapped around. Trembling hands reached out to touch that perfect termination, to caress that surface which seemed to be made of living flame. Licking his lips in anticipation, suddenly realizing that he was no longer cold but hot, sweating underneath his armor and buff-coat the closer he got to that jewel of his eye. Already accepting that it wasn't his- would never _**be**_ his, and trying to take it for himself would get him burned.

It would be worth it.

A bead of sweat dropped from his palm onto the gem, sending an electric flash across that tenuous connection. His arm jerked back automatically, even as his mind processed the image which had been sent to it during that instant.

Flame, hot, burning, churning, earth, magma, heat, sweet, energy, restrained, contained, untamed…

And a face.

Not just a face, but hair, the same color of that magma. Eyes, an eye, the same verdant green as his wife's…

Lips, the color of blood.

A sound on them, a word, a message:

" _Hello there, Big Boy."_

* * *

"Now, can anyone inform the class how Dust is formed?" A hand shot up from the front row, but the face shrouded by bushy eyebrows passed it over as it looked for another that was not forthcoming. "Hmm… Ah! Yes, who else but Ms. Schnee? Go ahead."

The hand retreated behind her back as the girl shot to her feet, the other one reaching up to loosen her stiff, high collar which suddenly felt way too tight.

"Sir! Um, yes, there are many theories on how Dust crystals are formed. Current thought has it that Dust behaves like many other resources and is influenced by the environments in which they are found. Like other mineral ores, chemicals are transported via fluid and precipitated through porous rock or cracks. Released from the surrounding pressure, they are then deposited in open spaces where the crystal lattice has room to grow and develop.

"Of course, this does not explain why modern analytical methods cannot determine the composition, even when using x-ray spectroscopy or refractometry. The molecular geometries of Dust remain a mystery, and no experts can agree on what controls their properties because the elements themselves seem to confuse the equipment. Some scholars theorize that the binding energy between the atoms is actually-"

"Yes, yes, thank you Ms. Schnee. But this is a history class, do try to leave a little bit of mystery for professor Rosenrot's lessons, hm? I'm sure he wouldn't be too happy about a student trying to usurp his new position."

"Yes sir!" Snapping a salute to hide her blush, the white-haired girl sat back down in her seat. Her hands remaining in her lap after straightening the hem of her tunic. There they would stay for the rest of the class.

"Now then, the part I wanted to establish is the fact that Dust is found primarily underground, which makes it particularly difficult to get to. It is presumed that the first discoveries were accidental, stumbling upon easily accessible deposits in caves and pockets exposed by erosion. However, later tribes and villages found Dust so useful that they actively sought out places to mine. Going so far as to band together, cease their nomadic ways and settle into permanent locations.

"From this humble beginning, whole economies were soon developed around exploiting this veritable boon to humanity. The Kingdoms! All formed nearly at the same time, practically overnight historically speaking. And all of them got their start one way or another via Dust. As a resource, or as a weapon. Goes to show that humanity thinks alike, no? Of course, it wasn't long after this that the first Dust-related conflict started…"

The droning of the professor soon turned into a buzzing noise, which she realized was actually a buzzing on her thigh. Surreptitiously, she slid the phone out of her pocket to take a look at the incoming message. The attached picture brought a smile to her face as she looked into the slightly grainy face of her new baby brother, swaddled in a light-blue terrycloth and held aloft in the arms of what could only be her father.

'The heir is born.' The caption read, and she had to stifle a giggle comparing it to the overwhelmed expression on the newborn's face, as if he already knew the challenges he was about to face in this fresh world.

She nearly dropped the rollout-phone as another buzz threatened to shake it from her hand, but she caught it again before it hit the floor. A new text.

'The mother did not survive.'

"…Now, can anyone tell me the origins of the most infamous family to come out of this so-called 'Dust-Boom'? Anyone? How about Ms. Schnee, you should know all about this. Ms. Schnee? Hello? Winter? Is that an E-scroll I see in class…?"

The electric lights powered by Dust buzzed loudly in her ears, like a swarm of beetles that were crawling all over her, and she felt like the world was watching her with millions of beady, black eyes- expressionless behind a face of apathy.

* * *

There was an awkward silence which permeated the air between father and daughter as they made their way to the docks. After the initial shock of being accepted into the premier huntsman academy wore off (heck, she hadn't even applied! Thinking she'd have to slog out at least another two years at the junior academy, Signal), she was made to realize the foolishness of what she'd done the previous night (even if it did get her into said academy). A fact the man walking next to her would surely point out to her sooner or later, along with an accompanying lecture and appropriate punishment. The worst of which he could do would be to to bar her from sweets, but that could not last two weeks anyway before she was shipped off to Beacon academy to be on her own.

Well, not entirely on her own, as her sister _had_ actually _formerly_ applied and was accepted into said school. But Yang wouldn't be so cruel to her baby sister- would she?

Sweating under these thoughts and the imaginary scolding from her dad kept her from paying attention to where they were going until a piece of glass crunched under her foot. She immediately stopped at this noise, looking up from her daydream to see that the path they had chosen from the police station lead back past the same shop she had patronized last night. The very place which had started this whole adventure.

Outside on the curb, the old man who presumably owned the shop was languidly sweeping up the remnant shards, minus the one she had crushed into fine powder. Without thinking, she bent down and started picking up some of the larger fragments, placing them carefully into the palm of her hand and working her way slowly down the street.

"The ferry leaves in 30 minutes, Ruby." The voice of her father reminded her patiently, but she was not to get up from her stoop until she had a complete handful.

"Maybe we can get the next one?"

Dumping the dangerous trash into the same bin the old man was working on, wordlessly he gave her an appreciative nod before she turned back to plead with her father. In doing so, she missed the pride-filled look he gave her back, only catching the one of amusement as she adopted her dreaded 'Puppy-Dog Eyes'.

"Oh, alright."

The next forty minutes were spent combing up the loose piece of debris and dumping them, followed by scouring the immediate area for any merchandise that was dropped during the heist and not noticed by the police while the curiously spry old man reset the shelves inside his shop.

So far, she had collected about three pocketfulls of raw Dust crystals. And, one oddly intact jar of ice-dust powder that was sitting amongst an anthill of its broken brethren. Thankfully, her father stepped in to help clean up the potential hazard.

It was astonishing how far some of the crystals had wandered, and she wondered if she hadn't been at least partially responsible for the dissemination when she tossed the thieving goons around like water balloons.

Peeking underneath a mailbox on the far side of the street brought an unexpected shock, as a brilliant orange crystal the size of a finger flashed out at her.

"Woooah…"

Stunned that such an out-of-the-way shop would have such an impressive specimen. The others she'd picked up, while admittedly dinged and scuffed from being manhandled, were of a far inferior quality compared to this one. By no means a connoisseur of Dust, nevertheless such a crystal she'd never born witness to before, even that one time her dad took her and her sister to the Vale National Museum when the Schnee Family Collection was put out on a traveling display.

It was also incredible how anyone could have missed it, even one of the many passersby on that busy thoroughfare might have spied it and been tempted to squirrel it away. Never mind thoughts of morality, one would have to be a fool not to at least _**consider**_ pocketing it when it was just laying there for the taking.

Of course, she was much too righteous to entertain such ideas- even if the butterscotch orange color seemed to be calling to her… she would be satisfied with just being able to hold it for a while until she returned it to its rightful owner.

Next time she was in Vale, of course.

When she tried to reach for it though, she realized one potential reason why it had stayed where it was. The mailbox was abnormally large, for packages and such she assumed, and that Dust crystal had rolled so far underneath that no one under six-foot could possibly have arms long enough to reach it. To say nothing of her measly 5'2" (She was only fifteen, she was still growing, darnit!).

Luckily, she had something the others likely didn't.

"Got it!"

Retracting her scythe as she cried in triumph, she made sure not to celebrate until the amber-colored gemstone had rolled clear onto the sidewalk and knocked up against her boot. Reaching down carefully, as if she might scare it and send it back into hiding, she plucked it from the concrete and quickly pressed it to her chest to prevent it from escaping.

"Oh, wow!"

This action caused a wave of warmth to spread throughout her body, radiating outward from her bosom and down to the tips of her toes, tingles jumping along her nerves and cascading off her skin like sparks. When she remembered to breath it was like it was the first breath she'd ever taken, like standing on the highest mountain in Patch after spending a week breathing in exhaust fumes.

She felt…alive!

" _Hey!"_

Startled, she nearly dropped her prize and whirled around to face her accoster.

"I just found it! I wasn't going to take it, promise!"

But there was no one there. Just the pedestrian traffic on either side of the street who heard her and glanced at her dubiously. But distracted as they were, they quickly hurried about their own business as the day began warming up once more.

"Okay, better return this." Obviously, her guilty conscience was catching up to her- and she hadn't technically stolen it! (yet).

" _No, wait! I don't want to go back!"_

She jumped again, this time in the middle of the street as she stopped and clutched her heart, cars honked at her to get out of the way.

"Sorry!" Apologizing, she crossed the remaining distance and dashed over to the other curb using her Semblance, the tires ruthlessly crushing the rose petals she left behind in her wake.

"Alright, that's it, I need to return this and go get some sleep." The thwarted robbery had occurred late at night with the police inquiry immediately following. Then the headmaster of Beacon academy magically appeared personally to deliver cookies and bail her out (she honestly didn't know which was better). Between it all, there had been no time to catch any of her required eight-hours of rest.

" _Or you could just head on home. No one would ever need to know."_

"No! Bad Ruby." She chastised herself. "Stupid, evil little thing, making me think wicked ideas." Glaring down at the crystalline culprit which she believed was leading her into temptation.

" _What?! I'm not evil! Wicked-cool, maybe… but not evil!"_

"W-wait…" Reluctantly drawing the crystal from her chest and holding it at arm's length, she looked into its semi-translucent face as if trying to see something trapped in the amber color. "Are you… talking to me?" She asked tentatively and in a low whisper, hoping that no one overheard and thought her crazy.

" _Well duh, who else would I be talking to?"_

"But- I mean, you're talking!" She immediately covered her mouth with the unoccupied hand when realizing she shouted again. "Dust doesn't _do_ that!" She whispered harshly to the object in hand.

" _As far as_ _ **you**_ _know. How many Dust crystals have you held?"_

Opening her mouth to reply revealed her ignorance. The only Dust she'd personally examined had been pre-ground, or already molded into cartridges. Thinking about it, true crystalline Dust had always been outside her budget, even the tiny ones.

"Umm… not many" She declared hesitantly.

" _Liar."_ She winced at how easily the voice sussed her out.

"Okay, well you'd be my first but- hey, wait! Why am I even talking to you, this is crazy!"

" _You have flying busses, robot soldiers, transformable weapons,_ _ **magic**_ _, oh, and carry a giant scythe twice as big as you. Is this really that crazy?"_

Rather than answer, she looked around surreptitiously to see if someone wasn't laughing in the background (probably her sister) for having fooled her with such an elaborate prank.

" _Nope. Pranking is my job. Only one allowed to prank you from now on is me."_

"What?! Hang on a minute, what do you mean by that?" Though she had a sinking feeling she already knew.

" _You're pretty slow, huh?"_ She sputtered a protest which to the people around might have looked like a seizure. _"Although, I guess I can't complain, seeing as I wasn't too bright in my day. Especially in social scenarios…"_

"Please," Ruby begged. "I'm totally confused. This- this is all just too much to take in right now, can you just tell me what's going on?"

" _Oh, yeah, sure."_ The voice, rather the crystal, replied with a chuckle which seemed to vibrate in her hand. _"Sorry about that. See, I've kind of 'chosen' you to take me. It gets rather boring just sitting around in a shop, ya know? The old man is nice, but he's put such a high price tag on me that no one who comes into this part of town can afford it. Well, not unless you were to rip him off, like those guys tried to last night. I saw the way you handled them, you're not bad. Plus, you saved me from becoming a toy for a stray cat. I'd be happy to tag along with you for a little while and see where it goes."_

"But, I-I can't just _take_ you!"

" _Why not? I give my consent. It's not like you'd be owning me. We'd be partners."_

"Partners?" She asked with growing incredulity but also strangely enough, acceptance.

" _Yeah. I am pretty powerful you know. Just, can't do much on my own these days…"_

In a way, she thought she could sympathize with the voice. Clearly it was intelligent, but trapped as it was in that form there was nothing it could do for itself. Perhaps she should…

"No, no, no, this is mad, this is crazy, I'm going crazy…" Turning on her heel, she began to pace back and forth on the sidewalk.

"Ruby?"

"Eep!"

Spinning around once again, she nearly ran face-first into her father who was carrying a paper cup of coffee in each hand with the label for 'Greg's Dregs' nearly covered up. After recovering from the near-catastrophe, he looked from the two covered containers down to his daughter who was standing primly on her heels with both hands clasped neatly behind her back. An image of innocence that normally he would associate with her having done something wrong… but seeing as he'd yet to have his coffee, he didn't care.

"Sorry," He apologized, handing her the second cup which from the smell turned out to be hot-chocolate. "I see you're pacing, if I had known you'd be done by now, I wouldn't have stopped for coffee."

"S'alright." She said, face hidden behind the plastic lid. "I still need to return the crystals I picked up, and then we can go."

Before she knew it, she was standing in front of the old man and fishing the found items she'd stashed in her pocket with her one free hand. The other still clasped around both the talkative orange crystal and her cocoa.

Taking the items again with a silent nod of appreciation, the man, hunched over with age, turned back to put the items into the display which was almost fixed apart from the glass. From the look of it, almost everything had been returned, a fact which brought a smile to her face knowing she had helped someone in need.

This was quickly lost as she noticed the obviously blank spot in the middle of the counter, a velvet cushion with a conspicuous indent still sitting there, waiting.

With a frown now in place, she turned back to the old man climbing down from his ladder and opened her mouth to speak. Before she could, the crystal sandwiched between palm and liquid began vibrating agitatedly.

Taking a moment to see to this distraction, lest she spill her precious cocoa all over the recently swept floor, the old man had enough time to step down and see what she was about.

"Um, I just wanted to say-"

A strange, knowing look accosted her, smoothing over the man's face. It took a moment to realize he was smiling at her behind that crumpled sheet of wrinkles. A deliberate nod which seemed to mean more than a simple thanks was the only other acknowledgment he gave, and she found herself mimicking the gesture before blinking and appearing next to her father once more.

" _See? Told you the old guy was cool."_

"Ready to go?"

"Y-yeah." She said, still unsure of herself for just walking off like that, and about the whole thing in general. Honestly, so many strange things had happened to her in the last 24-hours that she was sure Beacon would be the least of her worries.

" _Probably."_ The voice admitted with what almost felt like a grin. _"But this'll be fun. You'll see. I haven't had an adventure like this in centuries!"_

"Wait, so this has happened before?" She asked in a whisper laced with disbelief, both for herself and the surreal experience.

" _Hm? Oh, no, not exactly. I wasn't always like this, see?"_

"You mean… you were a person?"

" _Yeah! Sorry, I guess I didn't mention that, huh? We never got introduced. I'm Naruto Uzumaki, former ninja of Konohagakure no Sato, Toad Sage, and Jinchῡriki for the Kyῡbi no Kitsune! And I probably should have mentioned this earlier as well, but like all Dust, technically I'm dead."_

This time, there was nothing keeping her from dropping the cup which was in her hand, thankfully the crystal- _Naruto_ managed to stick to her palm as the paperware exploded in a lahar of sticky, brown liquid, not unlike how she wished the Earth would open up and swallow her whole right about now.

" _Nice to meet you, Ruby- I mean, Partner!"_

* * *

 **So… yeah. This happened.**

 **Honestly, I have no idea where I'm going with this (and likely not anywhere for a while). Unlike my other fics, this one I do not promise to complete (doesn't mean I won't try). This was literally just a: "Oh hey, here's this pretty funny idea that I think I and do something with, let me write it down before it goes the way of all the other stuff in my head like different species of sharks and calculus." . Basically, this is just something to get my creative juices going again. And the fact that it actually has relevance for the geology degree I'm aspiring for doesn't hurt.**

 **Basically: Dust is energy. Like Oil. Both are fossil fuels, meaning that not only are they limited resources, but they are made from something that was once alive (Which is like all carbonate rocks, BTW, not just petroleum). So yes, the world of Naruto is the past of Remnant, but they didn't exactly survive in the way one might think. So the question is: why are they talking? How? Winter actually hinted a little bit to this but you'd have to probably be a physicist (or read a lot of sci-fi) to guess. Rosenrot is a reference but also probably a red-herring, referring to the Einstein-Rosen bridge (rosenrot means Rose-red in German, just FYI).**

 **Can anyone guess the other two I've introduced so far from Naruto's world? Does anyone even care? I just ask to see if I've made it obvious enough, or if it's just a little too subtle.**

 **Anyway, back to something a handful of people actually seem to care about. Let's see if I can finish before** _ **I**_ **become a rock. Sayōnara.**


	2. Proterozoic

**Updated 11/28/2018**

* * *

 **I swear this will not be a regular update. I work on a geologic timescale, and this is just catastrophism at work.**

* * *

They say, the best laid plans of mice and men always go awry.

Laying helpless under the shadow of that mechanical guillotine, she felt more like the former rather than the latter, the irony of this comparison not lost to the cat Faunus in the diminishing moments before her demise.

How did it come to this? Looking back, it was obvious all along the downward spiral she'd been on. Not that she'd come from a high point to begin with, but from that already grim outlook, the descent into darkness was a subtle progression. Only now realizing just how deep she had dug herself as she looked up and saw the pinprick of light so far out of reach.

The destiny of man was failure. Why should her kind be any different? If she would pray, would any deity heed her deliverance?

"Blake, move!"

Whisking her out from underneath that artificial limb was not a god, but another mortal- her partner in crime. Being set back on her own two feet once again, she was not about to argue semantics.

"Look out, Adam!"

Both had to save themselves from the scalding flash of light which tore through the train car, the heat wave knocking them aside same as the reinforced doors at the other end. Quick to right herself this time, Blake was already on the move before her mind could lay out the next step. Leaping over the mechanical arm swung in her direction, she slashed at its exposed joints and unloaded her pistol at its optical sensors before landing in a roll.

Behind her, the metal monstrosity appeared to be unaffected by this effort, whipping around to blast at her shadow with its twin arm-mounted cannons. The alternating salvos of superheated plasma licked at the flesh at the small of her back, and soon enough would catch her in her mad dash to cover.

The beast stumbled and the round it fired flicked by her ear, crackling, sizzling with the faintest smell of cooked meat she disgustingly realized was her. She turned around to see her partner hawing away at one of its four supporting limbs with his sword as a lumberjack would a redwood.

He might as well have been using a butter knife.

A kick like a mule sent him flying towards the other end of the car- and the gaping hole which lead to the tracks speeding by below. Reaching out across that divide, she tossed her bolo-like weapon to wrap around his leg and gave a yank. Righting himself in air, Adam used this elastic opportunity to take another slash at the glowing red slit which was busily tracking his flight through the air.

-Too slow, though, to do anything about the crimson katana passing between its armor plates and cleaving its sensitive optics in twain.

Landing next to her in a crouch, they both turned to see the robot flounder in disorientation with a twisted sense of accomplishment. A feeling which didn't last long as the secondary routines kicked in and the quadruped steadied itself, rotating its torso while its feet remained planted, scanning the room.

Ignorance towards its capabilities didn't stop them from guessing what was going to happen next, so they promptly scattered before it could home in on them. Its confusion lasted only long enough for them to get on opposite sides before it randomly swept either side of the car with bright blue blasts of dying novae.

"How is it tracking us? I thought you took out its sensors!" Blake shouted over the din, not worried about the sound she was making as the gunfire easily overshadowed her.

"How the hell am I supposed to know!" Adam fired back, literally and figuratively as he targeted the glowing ion-compression chamber with his shotgun. "This thing wasn't even supposed to be here! It's not in any of the Schnee Company databases!"

"The we should-"

Returning to that first truism, the plan fell apart before it was even conceived. With tens of thousands of calculations per second, the mechanical immortal was fully capable of outthinking - not to mention outgunning them as it slammed its cannons into one massive kiln constraining a white-hot inferno which erupted all too soon.

A galaxy of pain swirled in her head when she tried to lift it off the floor. The roof above her had been painted in white stars even as the blackness of night gave way to a crimson dawn.

The blast had obliterated the superstructure to the train car, tossing her out the front, and Adam… she had no idea. With her head pounding in a bloody red migraine, she couldn't do much thinking at all. Probably a good thing, as the stomping of that monstrosity picking its way closer would have been a terrifying sound. As it was, it was just another tap-dance to the pounding in her skull.

Daring to open her eyes despite, she saw only the insectoid legs wading through a red carpet over to her. Surreal as it was, she didn't wait to check if _Gambol Shroud_ was still in hand, simply swinging out with it. Relieved, as the sheath skittered out along that scarlet fog and trailed the velvet ribbon with it.

Her weapon wrapped itself around a leg, and with strength she would have denied having (if she'd been in a place to form words), pulled.

Stumbling, the blast it had been prepping flew off into the fall-colored trees whizzing by on the mountainside. Not stopping there, she got up on a knee and strained again, further destabilizing it as it made to right itself.

Black and crimson streaked past the downed creature, ripping off a few hunks of armor plating in its wake. Adam skidded to a halt beside her, breathing heavy as he re-sheathed his blade.

"Bloody thing won't stay down!"

She wanted to nod, but turned it into a shoulder roll as another burst of blue energy ripped overhead. Not stopping her momentum, she ran straight down the maw of the gun, firing her own in a blind fury. Untangling her other weapon, she used both blades in a close-quarter blitz, a living blender which leapt all up and down the metallic exoskeleton. Over the arm, off the shoulder, down the back, under the legs and up through cannons spread wide looking in every direction but the right one.

As she passed, a flash of _something_ caught her eye. Smack-dab in the center of mass like some kind of gallstone, exposed where the armor had been rent by Adam's strike.

This distraction cost her, one rattling blow to the side of the head, which sent her plowing through several flimsy wood crates. Thankfully, these served as a buffer before the reinforced containers holding untold amounts of Dust, raw and unrefined.

She flipped to her feet just in time to dodge the fusillade of fire raining down on her. A more innate sense then threw her back to the ground as the containers exploded behind her in an angry rainbow. Colors lit up the rapidly retreating night sky which wanted no part with this shit-show.

Vertigo kept her on the ground longer this time, face pressed against that same gossamer-thin layer. Only visible when she was this low, clearly it was not the blood rushing to her head, nor her partner's semblance causing it.

Wearily she pushed herself back to her feet, the only thing keeping her going was a contrarian attitude buried deep in her DNA. She regarded Adam preparing another futile attack.

"It's too strong." She moaned. "It's almost like there's Aura protection. We should retreat."

"No!" Adam barked at her, making her flinch, but also making her realize that there were some things more fearful than his wrath. "We can't give up this easily! If Atlas has other weapons like this and we just give up, we'll never have a hope of winning!"

The bitter truth of this statement applied to more than just their specie's struggle. If she had any hope of carrying out the plan which had just formed in her head, she had to fight for it.

On her feet or on her knees, she would carry herself into the light.

"That light…" Experimentally she placed her head back to the ground, uncaring of the scrutinizing look her partner was giving her. Yes- It was there. "It's projecting something on the ground." She pronounced, sitting up, regarding the machine which had just about recovered from the sensory overload caused by the Dust-explosion. "Like a combination of radar, and-and brail."

"A secondary sensor?" Adam looked at his hand-tailored leather boots as if he stepped on a stubborn piece of gum. "So, floor is hot lava, huh?" He shot jokingly at her, reminding her of the childhood friend who once resided behind that bone-white mask.

"Exactly."

No longer giving them any time to confer, the Sentry whipped around to face them with a barrage of fire already on the way. They were forced to scatter, but already had a tentative idea of what to do. Blake leapt up onto the stacked crates while Adam flung himself directly at the machine. Just as the twin-cannons locked on to his predictable arc, a black ribbon wrapped itself around him and jerked him out of the way.

Trading place, Blake stuck herself to the armor as she swung her partner around to land on the other side of the machine. Without instruction, he proceeded to distract it while she slinked underneath its flailing arms which were seemingly incapable of swatting the fly perched on its nose.

She made her way to the thorax, to that jagged chink which revealed the sensitive electronic guts underneath. It was too small even for her hand, so she jabbed the tip of her sword deep into its bowls and twisted, jerked and pried while it writhed in calculated panic. Retracting the blade coated in glistening oil, she saw something else sparkling from deep within and reached for it.

Thrusting her hand into the gap which was barely big enough, she groped for that something which caught her eye, tearing through any wires in the way and ignoring the jab of plastic circuit boards. Her fist clenched around something that was too small to feel in the numbness of pain. But she knew it was there, nestled in her palm. Her Aura latched onto it like Velcro and she did not let go even as she wrenched her arm free.

It froze. Seemingly not just the machine, but the world around them as everything was suddenly far too quiet. The comparatively gentle clack of the train and howl of wind were drowned out behind the ringing in their ears. The armor stood there like a statue- as if it had always been there, planted as some kind of modern-art for the blue-bloods who owned the contents of this train.

"Blake, what did you-" A crackle. Something sparked inside the wound she had carved out.

"Move!"

Built-up energy came flooding back into the workings the moment it didn't have anything forcing it out. Valves and gates which had only been intended to work one direction were torn asunder as ionized liquid came spilling back along the path of least resistance.

Compared to the other explosions, this one was fairly tame. Full of shrapnel though, in the form of super-hardened alloy, and exacerbated by the fact that the two of them were at ground-zero when it happened.

Adam picked himself off the ground with a groan, debating the necessity of using the explosives they brought with them in wake of what transpired. Still, it was their mission to see that the shipment of Dust didn't reach its destination, and the train continued to speed onward yet.

It was, however, slowing down.

Blake stood there opposite, staring at him. Seemingly unscathed by some miracle and looking every bit as radiant as if she had just stepped out of the shower. -In fact, a soft, misty shroud, like the one around the shattered moon seemed to encompass her in a pale glow. Apt, for the look on her face could only be described as broken, remorse for what she'd just been forced to do stricken in those amber eyes.

"Goodbye, Adam."

It was almost impossible to hear her past the rushing wind, but he could read her lips by the expression alone. She was standing still but moving away from him, and it was too late to catch up. Devoid of its engine, the train car he was on slipped further and further away from the front, friction and entropy making him their fool.

Turning so she didn't have to face his disappointment and betrayal any longer, Blake allowed a single tear to fall and be whisked away by the cold breeze caressing her cheek. A moment of silence, before the darkness fled and she was forced to live in the light.

She sheathed her blade and placed it on her back, realizing her other hand was still clenched tightly around her conciliation prize. What rested in that pale, open palm was rather uninspiring. She almost let out a chuckle at the disparity of that postage-stamp sized gem and the trouble it has caused them.

Instead, with a small smile she admired the aesthetics. A faceted surface, tetragonal geometry winking at her with the light from the rising sun and revealing its tortoiseshell color, the yellow rays trapped in opaqueness.

A token, a totem of what happened today, she thought nothing as she slipped it into her clothing. Looking instead toward the big ball of flame ahead with increasing trepidation.

Where would she go from here? The world was not as open to her and her options were now even further limited. Now she would have to be on the run, not only from the authorities but her own kind. Constantly having to watch her back, looking over her shoulder and keeping at least one step ahead of life.

She shook her head, banishing these thoughts from her mind. Plans, she had come to learn, wouldn't always survive reality. She would just have to take things as they came. It was difficult, it was harsh. It was also the truth. Life was just…

" _Such a drag."_

* * *

" _Oh man, this is gonna be so awesome!"_

"Heh, you're more excited then even I am…" Ruby whispered, staring at the reflection of her necklace in the window with a smile that was obviously strained. Far past her image was the Island of Patch, her home, barely visible as a pale smear on the horizon. "I guess home's not that far away…"

"Oh! I can't believe my baby sis's going to come with me to Beacon!"

' _Someone's got the right attitude!'_

"Ack! Yang, too hard!"

Hands on her knees as her sister released the embrace, Ruby was given a chance to catch her breath and listen to the uproarious laughter inside her noggin.

"I'm glad someone finds it funny…"

"Aw, come on Rubes, you'll be just fine. You'll see." Normally used to her half-sibling's very physical displays of affection, this time Ruby shied away from the one-armed hug as she noticed her necklace dipping into her sister's ample cleavage. The thought never crossing her mind of where she herself kept the living charm on a daily basis.

" _Eh, you don't have to worry about me. I've seen lots way bigger- in fact, Granny-Tsunade was blonde too, and she had huuuuuge-"_

"Eew, eew, eew! I don't want to think about that!"

"What?" Yang asked, perplexed. "I said you were the bee's knees. I didn't say the bees _needs_. Although, maybe I should have, hmm… wait, have you even had _that_ talk, yet?"

"No, no, no! I don't want to hear this! La, la, la la, la!"

Saved by the bell- the personification of order and education known as Glynda Goodwitch that is- as her image projected near the front of their vessel. The deputy headmistress of Beacon proceeded to give them the boilerplate spiel, fulfilling her every expectation of her new scholastic career at the most prestigious and accredited huntsman academy, bar none.

It certainly sounded attractive. Maybe Naruto was right after all?

"'Scuse me, coming through!" The urgent call shoved past her and towards the bathroom.

"Eew! You just puked on my shoe! Gross!"

" _Yikes. I know the feeling man! Although, I seem to recall it trying to come out the other end. Not fun."_

On second thought, whatever happened from now on was his fault.

* * *

" _Oh, so it's my fault your sister ditched you?"_

"You were distracting me!" Hissing as she clutched the obnoxious crystal around her neck, looking back and forth furtively to see if anyone was watching her talk to herself. "I can't believe I even agreed to this! I should have just left you in my suitcase."

' _So help me if you do that I'll burn all your clothes.'_

Demonstrating the sincerity of his threat, the orange crystal in her palm glowed and palpably raised its temperature a few degrees past comfortable, forcing the girl to let go. He did feel kind of bad for it, but he really didn't want to be shut away in a dark container again, not while the sun was out and he was raring to go.

"Ouch! Okay, okay, geeze! Can you please just be quiet for a bit? I don't want to miss my chance to make real friends."

It could have just been her imagination, the relief from the heat making her think that the animated stone in her hand now felt _cold_. Not only cold, but like a black hole, sucking the heat out of her hand to the point it became almost no different than being burned.

" _I'm sorry. I thought that I was your friend."_

Unlike like the physical sensations, these morose words which slunk through her head made her flinch. Naruto didn't need a face for her to see the dejection in the dull luster laying against her shirt.

"I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that-"

' _Just kidding!'_ Without a face though, it made it significantly harder to tell if she was being deceived. ' _No, I get it. Really. You need people that you can interact with. Physically I mean. Speaking of: Six O'clock.'_

"Huh?"

' _Behind you-'_ *WHAM* *CRASH* _'…never mind.'_

Not unlike the previous day with the glass on the sidewalk, Ruby immediately lunged for the dozens of brightly-colored vials which had been spilled out on the stone palisade. Paranoia from interactions with Naruto had also biased her somewhat, for her hands lingered on a few of the vials to see if any others would call to her.

' _I doubt it. That's all pretty finely ground. I've found it's possible for souls to retain their identity when that happens, but exponentially harder. And considering how few solid crystals can still speak, I wouldn't bet on anyone "alive" in there.'_ What he failed to mention were his own reserved hopes which to this day he couldn't expunge. Hopes that he might talk to his friends again.

' _~Someone told me, every lifetime, we meet same circle of souls. To say thank you, or to say sorry, and once again exchange our roles…'_ Idly he sung a tune that had come on the radio the day before the rosette entered 'his' shop. What used to only be background music had, in his confined existence, become something precious and significant. A key, to the world he had left behind.

Meanwhile, outside as she cleaned up the mess she'd help make, Ruby listened to this and accidentally ignored the white-haired girl who was scolding her.

"…And-Give me those!"

"Careful!" Ruby cried as the vials she'd scooped up were snatched from her gentle cradling. "That Dust is really unstable." Somehow, she could tell just by proximity. The feeling of the vials' contents was agitated, like static. Touching them gave her the distinct impression they were a tad… unhinged.

"Are you serious?! You were the one who caused me to spill them in the first place you dunce!" Cowering under this scathing harangue, Ruby couldn't hear Naruto's defense of her and seeming to forget her own voice. "Do you have any idea what you could have done? This is Dust! Pure, refined, wind, fire, lightning! Does it cross that pathetic little mind what kind of destruction you could have caused?!"

"Umm… about 3.7 kilotons?" Ruby answered after a brief pause, listening to the whispered hint.

"Yes! Exactly- wait, what?" Momentarily thrown-off, the other girl seemed to go through her own mental calculations before her eyes widened in confirmation. "S-so, you know exactly how dangerous it is, and yet you were carelessly flailing about in the middle of the walkway!"

"I-I'm really sorry." The stutter of docility in her voice quickly giving way to annoyance the more she listened to the girl's criticisms and her partner's refutations. "Look, no one got hurt and nothing's broken, right?"

"Sorry? Do you even know who I am?" Fluster mutating into condescension as her pride took over.

' _Schnee.'_ The voice supplied, rolling his non-existent eyes. _'Only people more arrogant than the Hyῡga and Uchiha.'_

The latter two were a mystery to her, but she'd at least heard of the former. Briefly, and only in relation to their ventures into the weapons industry, so she had no idea what this girl's relation was.

"Weiss Schnee, heiress to the Schnee Dust Company: one of the largest producers of energy propellant in the world" A voice- not one in her head this time, thankfully- supplied. "…The same company infamous for its controversial labor forces and questionable business partners."

"Uh! How-how dare you!"

Ruby wanted to chuckle at how the uppity heiress was so easily taken down a peg by the dark and mysterious girl who'd just appeared out of the blue, but found she was the only one. Her partner, strangely silent.

Before she could comment on this, however, a sensation like a tingling between her eyebrows accosted her.

Oh, wait, that was just a sneeze.

Hang on, no that wasn't it. I mean sure, yeah, she did have to sneeze, but this other feeling was more like the other day, right before-

' _Ruby, run!'_

"Uh-oh."

The lingering ash from the explosion rained like snow as Ruby lay there in a moment of self-pity.

"Hey there, need a hand?"

Her answer to this was a cloud of black soot floating up from her lungs, followed by a good number of hacking coughs before: "Yeah, thanks…"

Allowing herself to be hauled to her feet- however short that journey might have been- she looked around to see that everyone else had abandoned her much like her sister. Then she looked up to her knight in shining armor (not to mention blue jeans and black hoodie). And up, and up.

' _Oh, it's vomit boy.'_

"…Vomit Boy." Letting go of the lanky blond's hand to clasp over her mouth in mortification she apologized. "Oops! I'm sorry, I didn't really mean that!"

"Nah, it's okay." He replied with a hand wave and in much the same dismal tone Naruto had, before he rebounded just as quickly. "Name's Jaune. Jaune Arc. Short. Sweet. Rolls off the tongue. Ladies love it." There was a snort at the back of her mind which she ignored. "…but you can call be Vomit Boy if you want." Shoulders sinking as he owned up to his probable nickname.

' _Well? Go on, introduce yourself.'_

"Oh-um, nice to meet you. I'm Ruby Rose."

"Hey. Nice to meet ya."

After this short interplay, the two stood there in awkward silence for an inordinate amount of time, a perfect storm of social anxiety preventing either one from kickstarting the conversation.

' _Why don't you try talking about that weapon you love so much?'_ For once there came a suggestion she could actually get behind. Following her partner's advice and unveiling her pride and joy, she noted his more supportive demeanor and wondered what had caused it.

' _You wanted to make friends. I'm trying to help.'_ He explained while she gushed over both of their weapons, knowing that she could handle the explanation with her mind running on overdrive. _'Kid reminds me of me, long time ago. Maybe taller- but I was thinking more emotionally. He's looking to be accepted by his peers, same as you.'_

Once pointed out, she was able to notice this, and felt infinitely more comfortable in Jaune's presence. But also, more at ease being on the school grounds in general. It was almost like she was meant to be there.

Of course, as it turned out, both of them were actually meant to be in the auditorium about five minutes ago instead of strolling the gardens. But with a liberal use of her speed-Semblance and a few more misfires, they eventually ended up where they needed to be before the commencement started.

Reuniting with her sister- and, later, another familiar face she'd rather not see again- Ruby proved too occupied with the headmaster's odd speech and the plethora of mandatory tasks for Naruto to distract her with his observations.

Not that there were any, her partner being a tad more reticent than she had known him to be. Having held his tongue already for several centuries, he knew there was a time and a place for everything. A bit longer wouldn't break him as he himself mulled over the strange but familiar feeling Ruby had noted before being blown sky high.

For the life of him, he couldn't place it.

Oh well, it was good to know that he was right. It _was_ going to be an adventure.

And the first day wasn't even over.

Laying there on her sleeping bag, facing towards the gothic arched ceiling overhead and paying no attention to it, or the rowdy group of prospective students gathered underneath. A letter to her friends left behind at Signal Academy sitting blank next to her. Eyes and mind focused solely on that wonderous gemstone held between thumb and forefinger.

Underneath the artificial light it seemed to swirl, color shifting from amber to butterscotch to poppy red and sometimes even violet if she held it just right. The crude, leather neck-strap tied around the base draped over her hand and interlaced in her fingers like vines. Eventually it would be nice to have a real mounting for it, along with a silver necklace for it to hang.

' _Just out of curiosity, is that the only reason you're staring at me?'_

"Oh, sorry." Herself changing color to a rosy hue. "I'll stop."

' _I don't mind.'_ He confessed. _'To tell the truth, as a child, I would have done anything for someone to look at me like that- well, to just look at me, period, instead of pretending like I didn't exist.'_

"Why?" Trying to be quiet, in surprise she came out breathless.

' _That's… a story for another time, perhaps. Sorry.'_

"No, I'm-"

' _Don't be. I was the one who brought it up.'_ Cutting her off to save her from having to speak, he realized something he had forgotten before. _'By the way, you don't need to actually talk, you know. Just think "towards" me, and I'll get it. Should have mentioned it sooner, heh, heh…oops.'_

Perhaps she should have been annoyed by his omission or hurt by this sudden reticence. But considering the fact that her partner had yet to shut up since declaring himself such, she was more concerned than anything else. So much so that she was unsure of what to talk about, afraid of stepping on any of his non-existent toes.

" _Hey."_ She thought.

' _Hey.'_ He answered back. She realized she could feel his smile, precipitating a small one on her own face.

That is, until another thought entered her mind.

" _Hey, wait! Does this mean you can read my thoughts?"_ There was a suspicious dearth in the wake of this question where it seemed the light in her hand shrunk away from the edges of the crystal.

' _Technically… yes. But only if I want to, and some thoughts I really have to pry. But don't worry, I wouldn't do that, promise. And that's a promise of a life- well, several lifetimes, I guess.'_

Anger dispelled, another thought manifested itself in response to his last statement.

" _You were… human, right? Is it still hard to think of yourself like… well, like this?"_

There was another one of those hums which sent tingles through her fingertips and reverberated in her bones.

' _Yeah. And I can never get entirely used to it, either. Not because I_ _ **can't**_ _, but if I do, I'll lose my sense of self and just become another hunk of rock.'_ Ruby frowned and mused how hard it would be to do that century after century. _'It was. Is. But it makes it easier to have someone to talk to._

' _Back in the shop, there were some there who were still "human", others who could still form a sentence. But they were rare, and became rarer as the years went on. Some were bought and others…'_ Biting her lips, she wondered if she really wanted to know what possible fates awaited these helpless souls. _'well, some I had to stop talking to. If I didn't, I felt like I would get dragged down by their madness.'_

Never had she contemplated the afterlife before. Not even when her mother died, she always focused on the fact that she just wasn't there anymore and wasn't coming back. Where she ended up didn't matter so much because there was the knowledge that they would always be apart. Maybe in the back of her mind she held an idea of a heaven or hell but never put much stock in it.

This though, if this were all that awaited them when they passed on…

' _My bad. See? Again, here I go getting all doom and gloom. I swear I'm not like this… well I don't think so, anyway. If we find any of my friends, I'm sure they'll back me up. It just gets so boring cramped up in here day after day, ya know?'_

" _So you've told me… about fifty-jillion times since yesterday."_

While appreciative of the attempt to brighten the mood, it wasn't until her sister popped her head in that she felt the melancholy air dissipate like a cloud of cigarette smoke.

"It's weird. You were never one to obsess about jewelry." Flopping on the sleeping bag adjacent to her, Yang commented on the apparent staring contest going on between girl and rock. "I guess tastes change as you get older. Hey, who knows? Maybe this means we can start talking about boys soon. Awe! My little sis is finally growing up!"

"Yang!" Grabbing her pillow to protest her sister's licentious remarks, Ruby accidentally dropped Naruto to have both hands free for combat.

Hurt by this, mentally rather than physically, he could bear the separation because knew it wasn't intentional. It would take time for the girl to get used to him as something other than a strange knickknack, and even when he proved himself useful he doubted he could ever amount to anything significant.

Far be it from him to draw her away from quality time with her sibling. He, more than anyone, knew the value of human interaction.

Thus, rather than 'yell' with a pulse of latent charge, instead he reached out with something softer, probing the cavernous room in order to get a better picture of what was happening all around him.

Footsteps on those stone cobbles sent piezoelectric jolts through him painting a clear image of who was where, and the salty sweat swapped electrolytes with the air letting him know the median of moods as they fell like a topographic map in his psyche.

In life he had been a sage. Connected through nature to a degree where he could feel a tree going through photosynthesis or a fly passing gas the next valley over. Compared to that, this was child's play.

That said, it only made it more disgraceful when he failed to recognize the potential danger to his partner until it was literally standing on top of him.

Damn, he really was getting rusty.

"Would you keep it down? Some of us are trying to get some- OW!"

Calling a ceasefire in their pillow-war to collect the wounded, Yang and Ruby turned back to their spot to see the white-haired princess playing hopscotch with their sleeping bags.

"Hey!"

"Sorry! I just stepped on this- oh god, you!"

"Look, I know you and my sister didn't get off on the right _foot-_ " Weiss let out another groan that might have been pain from either her toe or the bad pun. "-But that doesn't give you the right to stomp all over our stuff!"

"Excuse me! Need I remind you that **thing** _blew me up_!" Still hopping- both mad and literally, the heiress jabbed the offending object at the two sisters. "And I was just coming over here to tell you to be quiet, but **someone** left a boobytrap for me to step on! Who just leaves a Dust crystal lying around like this?!"

Ready to call a détente when she first saw Weiss- cut losses with that failed potential friend and slink off to lick her wounds- seeing what was brandished in that pale hand, she was ready to declare war all over again.

"Give that back!"

"I thought you would have learned the first time just how dangerous this stuff can be." Blind to Ruby's mood shift, Weiss proceeded to examine the extraordinary specimen in her hand with an aficionado's eye. "What's a little girl even doing with a crystal like this? Did you steal it or something?"

"It was a gift." Ruby ground out with a malice her sibling beside her had never known the girl capable of. "It's important to me. So give it back, _now_."

The punctuated last syllable registered as a command to Weiss's reptilian brain, drawing her attention away from the admittedly alluring gemstone and to the previously submissive girl. Even then, her purebred heritage so far removed from primal instinct didn't register the danger she was putting herself in, and she considered hanging on to it in the very likely chance that it was stolen Schnee-Company property.

"Ah!"

Pain registered though, an electric shock forcing her hand to let go of the crystal where it was then snatched mid-air by a frantic Ruby who quickly retreated with a reaction split between a scared rabbit and a cornered dog.

"Oi!" Busy coating her burned finger in salaiva, Weiss didn't see the elder blonde until she was breathing down her throat. "You listen Schnee and you listen good," Jabbing her own finger at the skin right above the hem of the exorbitant nightgown. "I'm an easy-going person and my sis is one of the nicest people you'll ever meet. So, I can forget whatever misunderstanding you guys had earlier. I already forgot what you said at the initiation, chalk it up to leftover bad feelings." That finger tapping on her porcelain skin suddenly hooked downward to snag the modest hemline, drawing the girl closer than she'd ever wanted to get to another woman, let alone one who was laying down a sermon at the end of a fist.

"But then you call my sister a liar, take her stuff, try to **bully** her?" Like the gem she'd been examining earlier, Yang's eyes changed from a soft lilac into an inferno of red trying to turn her into charcoal. "You do that again, and I'll send your prissy little ass back to Atlas in a box with a label that reads 'returned unopened', capiche?"

"I-um-I-I-"

"Yaaaang."

"Ruby, not now, I'm in the middle of-"

Yang was interrupted by a rattling right next to her ears. It caused her to blink and thus extinguished that captured conflagration. There was a sigh as she recognized both the sound as well as the tone in her sister's voice.

"Language." Ruby rattled the glass jar labeled 'Swear Jar'.

Disbelief with a twinge of disappointment filled the deadpan gaze she sent her sister, but she was incapable of holding it for long underneath the staggering weight of that adorable pout.

"I can't believe you brought that along." Grumbled Yang who nonetheless reached down to her folded-up day-clothes to fish out a quarter-Lien and drop it in the slotted lid.

She then turned back to Weiss who was still locked in the rigor mortis of incredulity, folding her arms and jerking her head to the extended receptacle.

"O-oh."

It took a second for Weiss to figure out what was being asked of her, and while fishing for any loose change she might have on her person, she debated asking just when she had actually used anything that might be considered foul language, but decided against it.

Miffed as the only currency she had on her was a five, she deposited the plastic chip in the slot and huffed at a reinvigorated Ruby. This bad attitude was once again quickly cowed, however, when Yang turned back to her with that same accusatory finger.

"You got off cheap."

All things considered, Weiss agreed, vowing to simply never cross paths with any of them ever again so long as she could help it.

A cold shiver ran through the orange crystal in her palm.

" _You okay?"_

' _Yeah, just had sort of a feeling. Like déjà vu, I think. Or a premonition.'_

Unable to be any clearer, she gave up, satisfied simply to have him back.

" _I am SO sorry about leaving you there."_

' _Again, don't worry about it. I'm pretty tough, don't you know?"_

Chuckling at the bravado while her sister went about straightening their sleeping bags, Ruby considered the actuality of this statement. If what he said was true (and really, at this point, who would doubt a talking stone?) then he was one of the few Living-Dust left in Vale- if not all of Remnant. What kind of mental fortitude that would take, she hadn't the faintest. But it had to count for something, right?

' _Be that as it may, I would prefer staying in contact with you if at all possible. Less for my sake and more for your safety. I have a limit to how far I can alert you of potential danger, and unless I'm in contact I can't tell you specifically.'_ Remembering the incident with Weiss and the cart earlier that day, she recognized that she would have to get used to such an early warning system.

" _Right."_ Slipping the loop over her neck, she debated for a second about the wisdom of keeping the brilliant gem on display. On impulse, she slipped the nearly glowing orange crystal into her cartoonish Beowulf T-shirt and went to lay down.

'… _Thank you, Ruby.'_ It felt warm and relaxing in its current position, a physical lullaby keeping pace with her deep breaths and slowing heartbeat. _'It gives me peace of mind when I know that you're safe.'_

And peace of mind was one of the only things he had left.

" _Goodnight, Naruto."_

' _Oyasumi nasai, Ruby-chan.'_

He had no need for sleep now. Having expended so little of his energy during the day, he would stay awake through all of the night just to make sure no surprises lurked there. Some might have called him paranoid, but there was little else to do other than listen to the sounds of rhythmic breathing.

More than anything, he desired to have a purpose again. With any luck, this place, this girl, would give him that.

Unbeknown to him, there was one more mind awake than he had accounted for. Already knowing the cat-like woman was still slaving away at her book in the dark corner of the room, he didn't think to differentiate the strangeness in her presence.

Blake watched the lights get shut off one by one out of the corner of her amber eyes. She had watched- more like listened to the confrontation earlier and filed away the personal profiles for later reference.

Just because you couldn't always plan ahead didn't mean that you shouldn't be prepared.

Though thinking like this reminded her of how woefully unprepared she was for the test the next day. Without anything else she could do to give herself an edge against the unknown, she closed her book with a marker at her current page and blew out the candle.

Phosphorescent eyes scanned the abjectly dark room, feeling still like there were things alive and stirring apart from the dozens of student hopefuls sawing logs. With a dissatisfied thought, she too closed her eyes and went to sleep.

' _Troublesome.'_

"Mm-hm."

* * *

OMAKE: FATE IS A CRUEL QUEEN OF THE CASTLE

Nora was here in Vale for one purpose and one purpose only: to kick ass and chew bubblegum.

Ignoring the fact that it was in fact two things, all of Remnant would be thankful the overactive girl still had more gum regardless.

Though as she continued to sit on the park bench waiting for her friend and would-be partner (not _that_ kind of partner, although it wasn't like she was opposed to it. After all, she and Ren had been together since children. Not 'together-together' but- you know what? Never mind) went to go purchase tickets for their airbus into the city, she was rapidly depleting her supply.

It wasn't her fault, of course, this gum just seemed to run out of flavor far too quickly and the bubbles she could blow were sub-par at best.

But rapidly working her way through a carton (a single pack was hardly enough to keep an avid user entertained for long) she ran into the problem of what to do with it after it had turned into a stale wad of eraser rubber. Ren had continued to nag her about swallowing it, and at the risk of earning his ire and thus doing without her beloved pancakes for at least 24 hours (a fate surely crueler than death), she had yet to find an appropriate method of disposal.

Then again, she was sitting on a park bench. Also known as the 'official' unofficial receptacle for unwanted and unloved items from homeless people to the infamous gum wad.

She looked left. She looked right. Operation: 'Ditch the Gross Pink-Stuff' was a go.

Lightning fast like her semblance, her hand flew from her mouth to the underside of the wooden slats and back again with none the wiser- save a very disapproving squirrel giving her the stink eye.

Confident that the little tree-rat wouldn't have the guts to call the authorities, Nora slid smugly into the ergonomically designed seat, folding her arms feeling, and she hoped looking, very slick.

"Eh? What's this?"

Being in fact neither, she neglected to realize that her gum had failed to detach itself from her finger and had even picked up a little hitchhiker while it was down under.

"Eew! Eew! Eew! Get it off!"

Latching onto the only solid thing in the mass which was a purplish stone, she yanked with the same might used to swing her Warhammer _Magnhild_ until it came free with a resounding 'pop'.

"Hey! What are you still doing here?"

Unknowingly, she managed to hold on to the little purple stone which she realized was actually quite pretty- in fact, almost… fit for a queen.

' _Good Lady, you have today earned my thanks! I am indebted to you for rescuing me from my fate. You have no idea how happy I am that you have found me, as it has been ages since I have met someone with such an open-mind."_

"Who said that?!" Nora whipped her head around in accusation, but the squirrel refused to meet her stare. "Was it you?" Eccentric though she was, even she had a hard time believing a rock could speak.

' _Yes, do forgive me. Allow me to introduce myself Madam, I am Hyu-"_

"Ooh, so it's like one of those electronic greeting-card chips."

' _No, actually, if you just allow me to explain-'_

"How do I get this thing to re-record? Do I press this? REN! IF YOU GET THIS MESSAGE, HURRY UP!" She screamed at the indigo stone quickly darkening with sadness and rage. "-OH, AND BRING PANCAKES!" She added as an afterthought.

With now two missions accomplished, she hurled the stone into the city as hard as she could and watched it sail off over the buildings.

"Man, now I'm bored." She huffed, flopping back into her seat.

And thinking this, she missed the final thoughts of the Dust crystal she unknowingly bequeathed with suicidal thoughts and unleashed upon the outskirts of Vale.

Neji Hyῡga was infinitely grateful that he hadn't been stuck with such an outlandish master, though he did pity whoever this 'Ren' character was.

' _May Fate be kind to that poor soul.'_


	3. Paleozoic: Cambrian

**UPDATED 11/29/18**

* * *

 **I'm baaaaaack. Sort of.**

 **Woohoo! First publication since finishing Butterfly's Dream! So thanks to all of you that are celebrating that with me, and for those of you just joining us. The latter probably has fewer expectations to live up to! I also hope to get back into my others stories which have sat by the wayside for far too long, butI suppose the easiest is to jump right back into the RWBY-verse. **

**That being said, how many of us grew up watching Toonami on Cartoon Network? Any Gundam fans out there? No? Probably not, I'm a special kind of weirdo, especially because I have this morbid need to do a crossover with RWBY. Because... small girls in giant robots... yeah...**

 **Meh. Probably won't happen, but I might include a teaser with the next update instead of an omake, just for shits & giggles. Which is what this story is primarily about for me. I think. Who knows?**

* * *

Luggage? Check. Paperwork? Check. Clothes that were both proper and comfortable for the long ride ahead? Check. Hair done up and offset at exactly 15.6˚ off vertical? Check. Implacable expression adorned? Check. Everything was to perfection.

Except that it wasn't.

No matter how precisely the airport's operations waltzed around her, no matter how mechanically the staff all went about their business loading her contingent of luggage into the private craft, no matter how pristinely white the polished marble floors were, it was just… wrong.

Or, maybe it was her. Feeling like a piece was missing.

Refusing to sigh and let the wrinkles molest her young face, she absently touched the fresh new scar just underneath her left eye. Painful sting reminding her once again of her loneliness- which wasn't all bad. Specifically, **his** absence.

The sting dying down into a throb, then a tingle, then a buzz just on the edge of her conscious.

"Good, I see you haven't left yet."

She spun on her heel- and almost spilled over on that perfectly-polished floor.

"W-Winter!" An almost identical face staring back at her, mutated by age-won experience and a slight smile in place of that almost-scowl. "What are you doing here?"

"What?" Smirk still in place but eyes conveying that iconic 'elder-sibling admonishment.' "I can't come and see my baby sister off on her journey abroad? Chances are that I won't get another opportunity to see you for at least a year."

It went unspoken that it could be more than that. Much more, considering the way their lives appeared to be diverging. Independence taking the almost identical daughters in different directions.

"Here."

Before she had a chance to apologize or comment on this unpleasant truth, Weiss was forced to recognize the proffered object thrust into her downturned gaze. Winter divesting herself of that singular thing which marred an otherwise immaculate and uniform image of a soldier.

"T-This is…" Taking the small box in hand before she even recognized what it was. "Winter, I-I can't-"

"I don't need it." She insisted with that marshal voice that made subordinates fall into line with but an utterance. "Doctrine doesn't allow for jewelry while in dress. Besides…" That exterior which was ridged and manicured as the building around them sagged for an imperceptible moment. "…I think mother would have wanted you to have it."

Truth was that she hardly deserved it, having absconded with the possession in a fit of teenage spite for her callous father- that same long-burning enmity which had her drop out of school and join the military, taking the memento with her.

This admission unvoiced, she reached over and opened the sandwich-sized box in her sister's hand to unveil the item resting on the baby-blue velvet within.

Very much unlike other Schnee possessions, this one had nothing of the family's heraldry. Myth and prestige had it being far more ancient than even the kingdom of Atlas. Though the veracity of that claim could hardly be confirmed considering how many times it had been repaired and reworked in its undeniably long lifespan. Expert appraisers could only determine one piece being of such ancient provenance, the only thing remaining unchanged throughout its countless reincarnations.

Weiss lost herself within the violet colors undulating languidly under the cool fluorescent lights. Engaged for a while with this gemstone whose inner fractionations were as intricate as the rest of the object, she let her eyes roam over the rest of the admittedly beautiful facet. The almost criminally simplistic silver wristband circling around and intertwining at the top into lovingly crafted grapevines. Upon the leaves of which rested a lone beetle whose abdomen possessed that singularly stunning Dust-crystal no larger than the nail on her pinky.

Yet another odd aspect about the artifact. Some opinions took the insect to be a sign of opulence, flora and fauna unheard of in the frigid northern climates adorning one of the most prestigious family's accoutrements, a show of far-reaching power. Others said it was evidence of its ancient origins, dating far back before the kingdoms- far before the continents had even arrived in their current positions.

Neither Weiss nor Winter cared either for these rumors. To them, its history was only recent, one of the last reminders of their mother.

"It's not something that should be worn daily." The elder instructed distractedly- one would never say, weakly. "Just for… special occasions."

"I'll take care of it." Weiss assured, slowly closing the lid of her own volition and holding on to it along with her sister, their hands overlapping. "I promise."

"First and foremost, take care of yourself." After that brief flicker of shared vulnerability, the elder returned to her polished military persona. "You can't do anything if you're not strong enough to do so."

"Right." Weiss replied with humility and a bowed head, clutching the box to her chest.

Crackling, an announcement came over the PA, insisting on the imminent departure of her craft. Seeing that their time was up, Winter allowed one more brief gesture of kinship as she placed a hand on that demure shoulder.

"I have faith in you."

More than that, Winter had faith in the precautions she had taken to insure it would be so.

Certain things would forever remain unsaid, though. Things perhaps more important than even those preemptive actions.

Watching her younger sibling board her vessel, the perpetual hum like tinnitus slowly faded from her mind. The bulkhead door shut and the warmth like the glow from a distant star abruptly died, leaving Winter in her natural state for the first time in years.

Under the unfeeling white lights, silent, cold, and alone.

* * *

"Finally, no more awkward small talk or 'getting to know you' stuff. At last I get to let my baby do the talking!"

' _Your weapon talks? No wonder you were so cool with a sentient Dust-crystal.'_ Appraising the weapon with an offhandedness that belied his interest, Naruto studied the compact form alongside his partner as if it were an old friend they hadn't seen in years.

Opening and then snapping her mouth shut again, Ruby had to remind herself of her situation amidst the disbelief of the supposedly ancient being's obliviousness.

" _It's just a figure of speech."_

' _Oh.'_ She could swear he sounded a little disappointed- more than embarrassed. _'How was I supposed to know? These days everything is interactive.'_ Including Dust-crystals, she marked absently, making sure to direct this thought away from said object. _'I mean, your scythe has what, three forms? Is it really so much of a stretch to assume its got some fancy electronics as well?'_

Conceding Naruto's point, then considering the applications of an artificially intelligent sniper-scythe, Ruby was taken away from her scheming by the conversation she had been automatically carrying on with her sister until that point.

"Uh… what was that again?" Ruby asked with chagrin, rubbing the back of her head in front of a curious Yang. "Sorry, I missed what you said. I thought I saw a scratch on _Crescent Rose_."

"Ah." The elder said with a smirk and sympathetic ear as she doffed her own pride and joy, confirming her blonde hair was still immaculately in place. "I was just saying that you might want to consider making friends with someone new. You know, just in case… we aren't on the same team."

Clutching a hand to her chest in horror, Ruby unwittingly smothered the crystal tucked underneath her blouse with this appalled emotion. Before she could protest this sibling abandonment though, he piped up in support.

' _She's right, you know. You might not get to choose who you're teamed up with.'_ Reminding them of their own meeting with a flash of serenity, and Naruto of a time long, long ago. _'Besides, I promise I will still be here, no matter what.'_

Wanting to believe in this gave her some comfort, but there was still something she desired to know.

" _But when you don't speak, it's hard to remind myself that you're there. Like the other day with Weiss, you didn't say anything. How come?"_ She really could have used more coaching back there.

' _True, but I'm still always here.'_ A faint but undeniable pulse reminded and comforted her, but the perceptible question hadn't been banished and he sighed. _'It's not my place to live your life for you. I can't make you friends or fight your battles. There are some things you have to do yourself and I can only offer advice.'_ Bitterly he admitted that seemed to be the only thing he was capable of now. Powerlessness was something he had been learning to deal with for the countless centuries that had passed, but it never got any easier when knowing there was someone who could use his help.

" _Well, what about after I blew up? I really could have used some advice on what to do then!"_ Ruby of course had no way of knowing just how experienced Naruto was with that sort of thing. She felt, and rightly so, that he should have piped up for more than just a few feeble words of support.

Knowing that he should have and could have wasn't any easier for Naruto.

' _I know. I'm sorry.'_ Ruby winced as she was reminded once again that she was talking to an empathetic entity. _'Like I've said, it's been a while since I had someone… alive to talk to. Some things I've forgotten how to express- or maybe they're new to this form. I don't always know how to put them into words. Yesterday I was distracted by a… feeling.'_ Another emanation from the living stone, contemplation or perhaps trying to emulate what he had experienced. _'It was like… nostalgia? No, I don't know exactly what I was looking for- and I wasn't really looking for anything either. It was more like… magnetism. A sensation of attraction like that, but emotional. Like there was something I was supposed to find close by.'_

Distracted in much the same way by Naruto's pontifications, Ruby was ignorant to the way her sister looked at her. Viewing the cute pout of concentration, one could forgive Yang for thinking that she was witnessing a turning-point in the maturation of her childish sibling.

Little to know that she was right.

"Hey, no need to go introvert on me now. Let's join the others and head out to the cliffs for the test."

Acquiescing with a preoccupied nod, Ruby followed her sister without noticing said others and their interactions. Nor was she aware that once again her partner had fallen silent, as she was lost in her own apprehensions and musings.

The feeling was back, Naruto noted.

Something like life yet wasn't, the former Toad Sage tried to identify the sensation lingering in the background like an accustomed smell, only noticeable when it was gone. Dulled by Ruby's overpowering proximity, he nonetheless knew the feeling too well to mistake it, despite its mutation:

They had company.

* * *

Nervousness.

Anxiety, anticipation, trepidation.

Despite what one may think looking at her unflappable countenance, her impeccable records or her pedigree heritage, these were emotions she was intimately familiar with. Like walking on a blister, she was simply used to dealing with it to the point where she'd developed a callus in the form of a tough and abrasive exterior.

If only she could turn herself completely to stone- her father would probably be happy with that. A display piece, incapable of talking, of stepping out of line. And incapable of feeling, heart hardened to the core like one of the mechanical knights which defended her former kingdom.

That would be nice.

It would be simple, at least, not to feel, not to have to choose. Even though she currently lacked a choice, forced to stand on a platform that looked suspiciously like a catapult. Unflinching device which was ready to hurl her into a dense and dangerous forest without question. Wilderness that would cede no quarter and give her no preference to a capable ally. At times with all these odds stacked against her, it felt to her as if she was fated to go through hardship.

Then she remembered that this _was_ her choice.

Maybe that's why she was so nervous. Touching that self-imposed scar under her left eye again to feel the pervasive sting like the bitterness of the winter she so loved, and to remind herself of her conviction. There was no turning back now, no sense in second-guessing.

Migrating to the back of her skull, an auditory throb began to accompany the physical, pulsing in agreement.

"Alright Weiss," Whispering to herself, _Myrtenaster_ alive in her grip. "Let's do this."

* * *

All in all, Naruto reaffirmed his choice in Ruby. Appropriate amount of levity coupled with an honest proficiency that bordered on genius- all without the attitude that normally accompanied it. The more he thought on it, she was like a combination of him and Sasuke in these respects.

Thinking on his former friend/rival though, darkened his mood and cooled his hue as it rested between Ruby's layered clothing. He could only hope that she didn't share the same relationship with her teammates that he had. The fact that he'd eventually reconciled with Sasuke after years of being nemesis notwithstanding, he wouldn't let her go through that kind of heartbreak if he could help it.

Luckily, she didn't take notice of this cold spot against her radiant warmth, wiping a drop of sweat off her brow as she dispatched the last Beowulf with careless effort. He was also guiltily grateful she was occupied by this minor obstacle as he continued to try and locate the sensation he had identified earlier.

 _It's hiding from me_. He realized distastefully. _Whatever it is, knows I am looking for it, and it doesn't want to be found._

While normally this would disturb him, in his younger years prompting him to do something foolish, time and experience taught him some amount of patience. Not that he could do much anyway, it would do no good to alert Ruby to this issue. Although…

' _Something else is coming.'_

Almost imperceptible against his myopic search for the concealed presence, this one was similar but more diffuse, even though it was much, much closer.

" _What?!"_

Startled by this revelation, and remembering the last time she'd ignored his advice, Ruby swung around with _Crescent Rose_ morphed into its rifle form and leveled it at the first twitch in the bush she could sense.

"Who's there?!"

"Eep!"

Sounding nothing like any Grimm she'd ever heard, Ruby quickly lowered her weapon before the humanoid noisily emerged from the underbrush.

Not having a face did have some advantages, Naruto realized. Like not having to choose between an expression of surprise, exasperation, hilarity, commiseration, anger, or acceptance. Instead, looking upon the newcomer he could suffice with:

' _Huh. Interesting.'_

* * *

Perhaps talking about his former rival had jinxed his current partner. More palatable to believe that, then believe it was Fate that put these two dichotomies together again.

"Um…" Dithering, the white-clad figure tried to come up with some excuse for the less-than dignified sound of surprise.

"Uh… hi." Outwardly, Ruby was trying to be cordial though doing a poor job of concealing her dismay. _"Oh no. What do I do?!"_

She could not blame Naruto for his silence.

Anger.

Aghast, frustration, disillusion.

Things she was used to- in small doses, not prepared for this bender and ready to purge herself of these emotions immediately. It would not be in accordance with the face of the Schnee family, but for once she couldn't be bothered to give a damn.

"You-!" _Myrtenaster_ flicked up in her wrist before she realized it. Before her body acted on its own and lunged at the other girl, she tried to restrain herself, to school her fluctuating temperaments.

" _This can't be happening!" Illogical. "Okay, this is happening, but it isn't fair!" Illogical. "Right, I did choose Beacon instead of Atlas, so I suppose there is no one to blame but myself. But really, who has such an asinine way to partner their students?" Logical. "What would they do if they had two people who simply couldn't work with each other? Surely there must be some way to avoid having her as a partner. For that matter, who's to stop me from just walking away? It would be my word against hers that she saw me."_

About to do just that, a throbbing buzz caused her to look up to the small gap in the trees where a bit of sky could be seen. Hovering there, almost invisible against the pale backdrop was a drone with its optics fixated directly on them. Realizing that she couldn't get out of the partnership, her panicked mind went back to looking for options.

" _So, I can't just bail now that they've seen us, that would be against the rules." Logical. "But there still should be a way to get out of this. Maybe after the exam I can complain to the headmaster?" Logical. "Yes, that's a good plan. I just need to drag her along until we can complete this exam." Logical. "Fine, let's do this."_

Turning her attention to the red menace who also seemed to be distracted by this confrontation, she re-adorned her royal air and strutted out of the bush purposefully.

"Look," She pointed a finger at the startled Ruby, working hard to use the hand without her weapon. "I know we're not friends, we don't even like one another. So! Let's just get this test over with and then we can go about figuring out how to get reassigned, alright? Good."

Without waiting for confirmation, Weiss marched off into the opposite direction from whence she came, not bothering to check that it was the right way and not staying to listen to the plaintiff whisper coming from her new partner.

"But, I **want** to be friends…"

By this time Naruto had recovered as well and was thankfully not overheard by Weiss either.

' _Don't worry Ruby. ~When the snow is getting heavy, trees just bend and let it go.~'_ Unbeknown to her, quoting another song which had passed through his mind. _'She'll come around, trust me. I'd like to think I'm a pretty good judge of character.'_

Despite the reversal of opinion and all the indicators to the inverse, Ruby was tempted to trust her partner, following his advice and hastily in the footsteps of the pale girl when she realized she was getting left behind.

Meanwhile, Naruto played the next lines of the verse in his head, weighing their aptness.

' _~So how many, so how many, broken bones it takes to know?~'_

He'd already taken his lumps, and if he still had bones left he would take them for Ruby too. What he'd said earlier was true, and he couldn't help her with everything. There would be pain, and he just prayed that he wasn't giving her advice that would lead to more of it than necessary.

* * *

Pain was not something he enjoyed, though he could not lie and say he wasn't quickly getting accustomed to it. Considering his future career, he would have to. Also knowing the not-so-honest way he'd come to qualify for said career, he had a lot of catching up to do and a lot more pain surely awaited him in this effort.

Fully cognizant that he had no one to blame but himself, Jaune Arc still wanted to try and avoid any opportunities for excessive self-torture.

Sadly, it hadn't worked so far.

"Jaune," The voice at his back sounded nervous to him, but Jaune knew it must have been an acute awareness of something gone horribly wrong. "Do you feel that?" After all, he was just beginning to realize the wrongness as well, and he was not half the warrior his partner was.

"Soul-crushing regret?" He asked back, half rhetorically, half genuinely hoping for some empathy. "Yes, yes I do." He felt something else though, hand still latched onto that glowing point which he erroneously believed was the relic they were supposed to find, and which happened to be the only light in that pitch-dark cavern now that their torch had gone out.

He felt like he was going to die.

A clicking, snapping groan like the rock around them coming to life seemed to back this up.

At that moment, he wished he too could have turned to stone. Either would be a terminal end, but at least that way he could avoid the pain, and there would be pieces for his family to remember him by.

All his heroes were stone already, living only in statues or as names engraved underneath epitaphs on tombs. His father, his grandfather, his great-grandfather, ad infinitum into unrecorded history. Compared to them, would his family even want to remember a disgrace?

' _Pathetic.'_

He really was. By his age, those he'd mentioned had lead battalions into battle, won tournaments, saved Kingdoms and liberated hope from the hands of darkness. They were true warriors, what he'd always wanted to be and finally believed he'd have the chance to become when he'd entered Beacon.

' _That's not what makes you a warrior. When you've hovered between life and death so many times that it doesn't faze you, when your hands are soaked in blood, when your name rings with infamy in the hearts of those who hear it- then and only then can you claim that title. You have to be ready to fight for your right to exist before you can even dream of being a warrior.'_

He'd been deceiving himself, he could admit that now. Little he could do about it, though. Barring all that, his one true regret was roping Pyrrha into his mess. Although, she would probably survive, she was strong, unlike him.

' _You got that right. Why couldn't I have gotten her? What is with my luck and annoying blonds? At least the last one had some balls.'_

Maybe whatever was in this cave with them would spend most of its time chewing on his stringy flesh, allowing the redhead time to escape, find another partner and complete the exam- wait, what?

' _Whatever. Look, you want to survive, brat?'_

For a moment, he questioned this. Whether he really wanted to, or whether he preferred to fall semi-heroically. Also, questioned just what that voice was since it sure as heck wasn't his conscience.

' _There's no such thing as a heroic death, trust me kid. Being a warrior is all about surviving. And unless you want to end up where I am, you best listen to everything I have to say.'_

"Um, Jaune…"

Maybe he could fight? Use that sword clipped to his waist to bite and scrape his way out of this? Maybe this cruelly divine voice was an awakening of sorts which would teach him how to wield-

' _Run!'_

Remembering finally that that was also an option.

* * *

"Would everyone just hold still for like, 2 seconds?!"

That was certainly a question. It was a lot to ask of the eight rowdy teens who had haphazardly assembled at the ruins and were under various pressures, including the ever-marching clock.

The bronzed Amazonian and her incompetent partner had just been smacked across the battlefield and would be dazed for at least that long. It was pushing the upper-limits of patience for the hyperactive ginger girl who rode in on the Ursa Major. And the high-strung heiress really had no choice in the matter as she was carried along riding shotgun on a Nevermore's talon.

Not all that unexpected, in Naruto's estimation.

"Um, Yang?" Pointing to her stranded partner while at the same time beseeching her _other_ partner just what the heck he meant by that and what she should do about it.

' _Whatever you do, don't-'_

"She's falling."

With an internal sigh, Naruto admitted that he should have expected Ruby to do something reckless at some point. His own youth had not been characterized by the best decisions, taking on beasts of similar stature when his allies were in danger. There was, however, a distinct difference between his risks and Ruby's.

"I got this!"

Naruto marked the way Ruby charged into the fray to take on the threatening arachnid. No doubt she was fast- faster than he had been, certainly- keeping a skosh ahead of the ferrous feathers raining down upon her from up above. No doubt too that they were quickly getting closer, and would eventually snag her before she reached her target.

"Oof!"

Leaving her pinned through the hood of her cape. Helpless as the Deathstalker approached, and unlike him, without the benefit of an overpowered demon to give her an energy boost, or the good-grace of Uzumaki-luck.

She did, however, have him. So when she found herself at the bottom of one of her foolhardy decisions, he was already running down the very short list of options available to him before the giant scorpion finished ambling its way over to them.

She was just starting to get a bit nervous when he had at last settled on one of the most ancient, venerated, feared, and overused techniques to deliver her from harm:

The "I-Told-You-So-no-Jutsu."

The menacing claw with size of a backhoe wasn't nearly so frightening when it was frozen in a block of ice, and the creature it was attached to struggled to remove it like a child who had licked a frozen lamp pole.

"You are so childish." In a tone that made him bristle against her undershirt, Weiss berated her partner. "And dimwitted, and hyperactive, and don't even get me _started_ on your fighting style."

But…

"But… I admit I can be a little… difficult. So if we are going to do this, we're going to have to do this… together."

For him, Weiss's intervention wasn't a surprise, even if he hadn't sensed it at the last second. Though she kept a guarded exterior, he could 'see' through that effortlessly. Both because of the subtle emotions she exuded, and because he knew her type like the cut of his cabochon.

' _See? Am I right, or am I right?'_ Naruto snarked, knowing Ruby couldn't backtalk while accepting the hand up from the other girl. _'Now, if you want to beat these guys, I suggest you listen to_ _ **everything**_ _I have to say before running headlong into danger again.'_ Putting even this chance abysmally close to zero, he decided to talk fast.

Rejoining the other prospective students, Ruby was silent as she split her attention between listening to the oddly battle-wise crystal and keeping an eye on her surroundings. Seeing that the headstrong young woman was to remain silent for a while, the others looked amongst themselves for anyone who had an idea on how to escape their predicament.

"Well, we have what we came for. No use in sticking around, right?" This gem of lazy logic came from the black-haired girl Ruby's sister found herself partnered with, and quickly found acceptance within their accumulated group of eight.

"Run and live? That's a plan I can get behind." As if that weren't what he had been doing the entire time, Jaune piped up before wincing at an unknown jab to his tender ego, disguising the reflex with a hand behind his back which also concealed something in his closed palm.

Agreement was all but unanimous and they broke up intuitively into groups of two or three. Wordlessly they fled, too much concentrated on covering the retreat for banter.

Even in a situation that should have been seen as shameful, Naruto was gratified for his partner. He had in fact not given her much, as promised, merely making observations which he had witnessed from the short conflict. It was up to her to use this information to pass the exam- not to mention make sure her comrades made it out safely.

Which was why he glowed with pride from the rear of the pack as Ruby made sure she was the last one to retreat and that no unfortunate stragglers were left behind. It was not only a manifestation of learning, but of her inherent attitude.

 _You watching this, old man?_

Focusing on the drone that was so far away it was less than a gnat on the Nevermore's notice, Naruto listened loud and clear to the electronic missives it was sending back and forth to its controller. He could only imagine the faces of the adults as they watched on.

* * *

"There," Unaffected after several minutes of running, the Champion from Mystral directed her spearpoint to the spiderweb of ruins that lay between them and their finish line. "We need to get across and somehow get back up that cliff."

"Alright then, let's-"

"No." Abrupt and firm, the others turned their heads. "Going out there we'd be sitting ducks."

"Are you daft?" A huffing Weiss questioned her partner. "We _need_ to cross in order to get back to Beacon. Besides, we're sitting ducks **here**!"

Acknowledging all three points, Ruby bit her lip in concentration. "We should double back into the woods."

"That's-"

"She's right." Though looking less sure of himself, the second-place in category for 'most awkward student' spoke up. "We've only outrun the Deathstalker and shaken the Nevermore by going through the woods. But the moment we go out into the open, we've lost the advantage."

"The trees will give us concealment, plus they should continue to slow that big bug down." How much was debatable, as they all heard the telltale crashes of forestry growing closer.

"-It's an arachnid." Realizing there was a time and place, Weiss changed a flush to huff. "We'd just be wasting time going in the wrong direction- we're wasting time now!"

"No, we'd have to take care of them sooner or later." Ruby confirmed with a seriousness that had the older girl recoiling. "And I'd rather it be now, on our terms."

"I'm with ya, sis." Further boosting the confidence that Ruby inspired, Yang slammed her fists together. "So what's the plan?"

"Whatever we do, we better do it fast." Despite his energetic friend, Lie Ren was not comfortable with such excitement. Not that he would let it show behind his mask of stoicism.

"Wait-we're not seriously going along with this, are we?"

"Yes." Face not betraying her motivations, Yang's partner broke her soft-spoken persona. "It makes sense."

 _Logical._

"Fine! I trust you at least have more of a plan than just 'run and hide'?"

The pensive look Weiss received in return did not inspire hope, and not for the first time she wondered what she had gotten herself into.

* * *

For the fifth time in as many minutes as she sat perched in her crook in the trees, Blake wondered what possessed her to go along with this plan.

Less a plan and more like a hairbrained scheme, it could have been excused for having such a narrow window with which to prepare it. That didn't explain her assent, though.

" _Was I really so spiteful to the Schnee that I'd put myself in harm's way?"_

No, putting herself in unfavorable situations was something she was well-versed in. And by now she had accepted that she was more qualified than most in sneaking out unscathed, and hence a pretty good candidate for these kinds of jobs. Probably why she thought becoming a huntress was a good idea in the first place.

' _Besides, you're not really the one putting yourself out there, are you?'_

Reminding her of the one who'd purposefully drawn the short-stick, Blake had to wonder what the blonde's motivation was.

Jaune was wondering the same thing.

' _Because you can hardly control your bladder, much less your emotions.'_ Came the callous grunt which Jaune barely heard over the sound of his chattering teeth. _'So quit your winging and man-up. I thought you wanted to be a fighter?'_

" _Yeah, not bait!"_

' _One and the same brat. You're a tool, whatever is needed of you. And right now, you've found yourself in the unenviable position of being one of the few with initiative, which makes you a leader. And that requires even more sacrifice.'_

Once again unable to refute the voice's logic or tone, Jaune instead focused on the blade rattling around in his hands.

' _-And tighten up your grip, widen your stance a little, quit plodding around on your heels unless you want to lose them. If you want to survive your first day as a moving target, you better be ready to run.'_

Part of him wanted to protest, to declare that he was tired of running.

-That was until the Deathstalker plowed through the remaining underbrush between them and snapped at his Punchinello face. Annoyed, it shrieked when Jaune managed to stumble backwards with his shield wedged between him and an even more unenviable fate. Spitting mad after chasing these morsels for ages- literally, as the young man found out to his disgust when the greenish-black liquid splattered against his silvery armor.

Running once again became an appealing option.

But the web they set had already started to enclose around him. A black ribbon burst from the shadow of the trees, snapping out and hogtieing the Deathstalker's left four appendages. The beast stumbled onto its side, no longer caring about the single speck of fear in front of it.

Like boredom, the seconds which passed as Blake hung onto either end of the snare were excruciating and long. Unlike boredom, she had no time to question her motives and only enough sense to wonder what the hell was taking her partner so long.

"I hate to _stick_ it to ya…" Smirk not disguised by the strain of exertion, Yang hefted the sapling over her shoulder and prepared to hurl it like an atlatl. "But maybe it's about time you _leaf_!"

Likely delayed trying to come up with that pun. Why did she have to be stuck with someone so troublesome?

While it was grating on her nerves, the blonde's interdiction was far more annoying for the Grimm as the tree-trunk was wedged under its thorax. But that was all it managed, as the scorpion struggled to pivot towards this new pest with the branches tickling its underbelly.

"Death from above!"

Short leap though it was, the little girl wielding the very big hammer was more than enough leverage to turn that nuisance into a full-blown issue when her blow descended from the canopy and struck the wooden beam.

Yang's back and tough leather jacket acting as a fulcrum, the beast was upended in a flurry of limbs which Blake gave a wide birth as she let go. Blind flailing smashed and felled several surrounding trees, shackling the arachnid with its own efforts to escape.

"Heh, _nailed_ it." Both Nora and Yang paused for this bit of cheek and a high-five before joining their comrades on raining down vengeance on the beached monster.

* * *

Throats coated by the cloying pine dust and eyes overcome with the stinging, vaporized sap, the eight waited cautiously until the dust settled before declaring victory.

A good thing too, for it wouldn't come that easily.

"Seriously?!" Not the only one thinking it, Ruby's disbelief could not be contained and spilled out of her mouth.

' _Hm. Tougher than I expected.'_

Even such a long-lived Grimm should not have been able to weather their onslaught. Hesitant to call it unnatural though, for everything about these creatures was the antithesis of the word.

This just seemed excessive.

"And… I'm outa dust." Frowning twisting while she checked her pouches and chambers of her gauntlets, Yang looked around to see the same consensus.

"I was equipped for area attacks," Justifying her own failure, Weiss weighed _Myrtenaster_ against the wounded creature. "not… _ **this**_."

"I don't think the headmaster could have expected this."

"No, we have to keep trying." Ruby asserted, though noted that she herself was down to lead-ball ammo. "Even if it isn't for the test, there isn't anything else we can do."

"Fine, but we still have to take care of that thing." A fair finger pointed to the groaning creature.

"Not to mention the Buzzard." Yang jerked her thumb to the hovering black speck, just waiting for its chance.

"Well, anyone got a plan B?"

Looking to the two likeliest sources only to find one missing. Not seeing the Jaune, most assumed he had done the smart thing and skedaddled. A few knew differently.

 _Reckless._

Ironically Jaune grinned. "Plan B, coming up." From straight D's to a B, not bad for the end game. If it worked, he would be happy.

' _More like Omega.'_ Clearly not as satisfied, Jaune figured that one way or another, he was going to be hearing more of that grating and disgruntled voice. _'Lasts resorts aren't supposed to be the first alternative.'_

" _You got a better plan?"_

' _With your pitiful strength? No.'_ With a huff and something which sounded like a grin, concealed by the abrasive texture and the fact that he didn't have a mouth. _'If you survive, we need to work on that, as well as plans that don't involve you getting killed. It's unbecoming of a leader.'_

"I'll keep that in mind."

Remembering for the duration of time that it took him to leap up onto the Deathstalker's overturned belly, the rest of him would surely not last much longer than that. Trying to find his footing on the squirming creature like on the deck of a ship in a squall, he looked to the horizon. Cupping his hands to project his quavering voice.

"Hey…Birdbrain!" The sound of his own voice made him wince, not least because the circling avian wavered in its flight and circled around. Far off but getting rapidly closer, the Nevermore honed onto his fear. Gulping, he realized he'd been blessed to stop thinking. Otherwise he might be having unproductive thoughts.

"What is Jaune doing?" Spotting at last her fellow blonde, Yang interrupted the panicked deliberation.

"This is no time to be fooling around!" Weiss admonished.

"Jaune!" Ignoring the comments in favor for partner's safety, ignoring the logical decision which was to flee, Pyrrha lunged forward only for a quick hand to hold her back. "What are you doing?! Get down from there!"

Ignoring it all, including the divebombing black streak screaming down at him, Jaune concentrated on fiddling with the sword in his tense grip. Noting how useless it- he was, his whole life. And waiting for the not-so-silent agreement on this point.

It never came.

' _Loosen up, kid.'_

Eyes which were directed to the undulating black mass beneath him blinked at the uncharacteristic remark. He wanted to be upset, but couldn't.

' _Your grip, kid. It's too tight now.'_

Indignation replaced incredulity. What was the point in this lesson now, when he could practically feel the talons like ripsaws on the back of his neck? Could practically see the-

He **saw** the Nevermore divebomb straight into the Deathstalker's exposed hide, ripping it to shreds and the fountain of black blood instantly sublimate into an ecstatic mist which washed over them all.

It never came.

' _Reckless.'_

Recognizing the remark, he noted that it clearly didn't come from the usual source, the jovial lilt undisguised and projecting a friendly smirk on his conscious.

"You alright Jaune?"

Was he? He blinked- could blink. Could see, could think. Body was intact, even if is was comically borne in the arms of a girl almost half his size. He wasn't complaining.

He heard a sour gripe emanate from the concealed lump on the back of his hand under his pigskin glove. Yet another assurance that this was so.

"Y-yeah. Thanks…uh, Ruby."

"You're welcome."

Before she could set him down on his unsteady feet however, the Nevermore reminded them that they had only dealt with half the problem. It did so with a catastrophe of feathers launched every which-way from its ruffled flapping of wings.

"Hang on!"

He did so, right until she ungracefully deposited him where the rest of their gaggle had taken cover, whisking them out of harm's way with a flourish of rose-petals which were chewed up in their wake.

"Way to go, Scarecrow!" Yang was the only one to greet him with something resembling a smile, bolstered by the cheery thumbs-up but detracted by having to duck underneath another arrow which very nearly clipped her hair and doomed them all.

"Jaune! Are you alright?" Too concerned to be happy, Pyrrha slid in next to her partner and manhandled the shell-shocked boy to check for wounds.

"Great, the gang's all here. Now we can die together."

While pessimistic, no one spoke to contradict this.

" _Please tell me you have something?"_ Hoping that Jaune's innovative interlude was enough time for her partner to come up with something, Ruby clutched _Crescent Rose_ , prepared to do something regardless.

' _Maybe.'_ Realizing he wasn't inspiring confidence, Naruto added. _'I have an idea.'_

" _Will it work?"_

' _No clue.'_

" _What are the chances of it succeeding?"_

' _By what standard?'_ Naruto waffled, not doubting that his analytical skills had improved over the centuries, but wondering if he should divulge the abysmal odds. _'I mean, my luck with near-impossibilities is actually pretty good-'_

" _Let's do it."_

Next to her something stirred, and Blake glanced down to see her partner's unusual sister doing something… unusual.

Rather than ask what, she paused in her own internal back-and-forth to watch Ruby fiddle with one of her rounds held loose in the leather bandolier around her waist. With impressive canines and jaw strength for a human, she watched the petite girl bite down on the matte-gray tip and wrench out the projectile, spitting out the deformed lead onto the ground.

What she did next should have been even more strange, but a light lit up in the Faunus's eye- or was it that brilliant orange crystal that Ruby fished from around her neck? The perfect hexagonal prism pulsating with what looked like anticipation as she jammed it in the vacant neck of the cartridge. Despite its deceivingly large size, the crystal wedged in there with no more effort that could be removed with a swipe of sweat off her brow when she had finished.

As she was carefully loading the extra-special projectile into the breech, Ruby looked up to see the prying, amber eyes of the black-haired girl staring down at her. Blake looked unblinkingly between the weapon and the wielder, settling with a nod.

' _Hn.'_

It seemed her life from here on out was destined to be troublesome.

The sound of a heavy bolt locking in place echoed behind her as Blake vaulted over their rapidly deteriorating cover and ran straight at their enemy. The Nevermore's rain of feathers had only just abated as the Grimm tried to again take to the sky and get a better vantage on its concealed prey. Seeing Blake's blitz, it came back down ungainly with a squawk and a beating of wings, one of which launched a new salvo of arrows downrange.

They struck true- against a doppelgänger made of water which rained to the ground in its original 's shadow as she continued onwards. Another noise of indignation, another fusillade of feathers launched at the flighty cat who bobbed and weaved and skirted through the impenetrable rain, sometimes falling but picking herself up from her dispersed copies.

These seconds were the longest by far.

It was just a handful of them as Ruby lined up her shot, but Blake was pushing the clock to keep just ahead of the Nevermore. Occasionally it felt like she didn't, the phantom pain of the flachette piercing through her breast and making the heart underneath skip a beat. But still her body flittered onward, moved by something out of her control like her breath which came one after the other.

What was taking her so long?!

Ruby too felt like her body was not under her control. Unlike Blake, too many thoughts were running rampant through Ruby's head as her finger quivered on the trigger and the black bird jerked in her sight window. All she had to go on was Naruto's assurance- that and her own ability to hit the target without hitting her ally which suddenly came into doubt.

' _Hey,'_ Her body's movements came to a stop. _'I told you, it'll be alright. That's a promise of a lifetime.'_

Her finger hugged the trigger.

The bang of the projectile leaving the muzzle was little more than a party-popper in comparison to the roar like a freight train from its journey down the barrel. An apt description as the weapon in her hand rumbled and screeched and tried to shake its way out of her grip, her hands eventually letting go of their own accord when they started to steam against the blistering metal.

Which was nothing compared to the other end.

Blake stared up in blind wonderment at the blast which knocked her off her feet, feeling like her shadow was permanently etched into the ground from the orange ball of energy passing within hairs of her- hairs which she noted with a sniff had been singed.

The Nevermore was nevermore. A few harmless feathers floating down to the ground next to a season's worth of leaves before they vanished into black dust. It left things clear for the group to stand and stare at the picture of their salvation, which looked suspiciously like the apocalypse as the semi-circular bite taken out of the trees continued to smolder.

"Did we… did we win?"

No one, not even the voice in his head piped up to knock Jaune down a few pegs.

Until Ruby shattered the silence with a non-sequitur.

"Naruto!"

She too disappeared into a flurry, which also ignited and disappeared before they hit the ground.

"Ruby-wait!"

And before her sister or anyone else could stop her. Yang sighed with resignation. "I'm going after her." Looking back at her partner as an afterthought, who gave a small sign of understanding.

"Wait- wasn't there a time-limit to this test?" Staring off in the angle of incidence, Weiss wondered if she could still complete the exam on her own.

"Yeah, there is." A check on her shoulder prevented her from further deliberating as the black-haired girl strutted by her. "So I suggest you hurry up and find your partner and her friend."

"Isn't that blonde her sister?"

Blake shrugged without turning back, following the other two.

Internal debate was not limited to the heiress as the other four looked between themselves.

"I should go help Ruby find her necklace." Initially manifesting as a question as Jaune sought approval from his partner, he soon realized that he was going to do so regardless. "I owe her one for saving me."

The excuse was weaker, not to mention unnecessary as he noted the redhead smile and move off in step with him.

"Hey! Where's everyone going?" Feeling left out, Nora was only a skip and a hop behind the other duo "Are we off to see the wizard?"

An invisible tether dragged Ren by his collar, hangdog expression as he followed his childhood friend. "Somehow I feel like we're very far off the yellow-brick road…."

Weiss watched the blonde leading the blind while arguments were bounced back and forth in her mind like pong, ever increasing in speed and decreasing in intelligibility until they were nothing more than a blaring drone, then an excruciating buzz.

"Gah! Alright, fine!" Reluctantly coerced, she stormed off after the imbecilic procession in a huff, the bracelet she had worn for good luck jingling merrily along the way. She supposed she needed the red menace to pass after all.

Anyway, surely Ozpin couldn't fail all of them.

 _Illogical._

* * *

OMAKE: IGNORANCE IS PISSED

Not much bothered Nora. Certainly not the chaos of their initiation which even now was rapidly being digested in her mind and fueling her desire for more excitement. And certainly not the unnatural glint emanating from a tree just off the path which drew her like a moth to a flame.

"Ooh, pretty!" Popping over and admiring the Granny-Smith-green gemstone, ensconced in the tree branch.

' _Ku, ku, ku. Why, hello there, little girl.'_

"Hi!" Unfettered towards the voice which came from nowhere. "My name is Nora!"

' _Nora? What an interesting name for an interesting creature, ku, ku, ku.'_

"Thanks!" Talking to her abstract reflection in the polished surface. "What's your name? Do trees even have names? Since when can trees talk, anyway? Ooh- are you a species of talking tree? Is that a racist question?"

' _Hmm, it has been so long since anyone has asked me that question. I am one who goes by many names and many… skins.'_ Doing the best to ignore the pelting barrage of questions and keep things on track. _'But I am not the tree, merely the "pretty" gemstone wedged in it. It has been a very long time since I entertained such… animated questions as I have been here a very long time. Long enough for this once-sapling to grow up around me.'_

"Oh, I get it." Clearly not, as her eyes continued to wander unfocussed.

' _Perhaps you could help me? I've been stuck here ever since someone rudely cast me into the scrub which became this beautiful forest, and I so long to see what the world has become in my absence.'_

Still not in the least bit suspicious, Nora weighed the benefits of trying to extract the pentagonal crystal. It looked pretty well stuck in her opinion.

"Eh, I'm kind of in a hurry. We're actually in the middle of a test, you see."

' _A test? I could assist. With my experience, I am sure I could be… invaluable.'_

"I don't know…" Not enticed by monetary gains. "I mean, you don't even have arms!" Flailing her own and glancing at the unmoving branches as if they were about to contradict her.

' _Ah, but what I lack in physical capabilities I could make up for with intelligence.'_

"I'm good. I got Renny for that."

' _But surely "Renny" doesn't know everything. I have been around for a very long time, I could teach you all sorts of things.'_

"Well duh, that's why we're going to school."

' _What if I told you I knew things your teachers didn't? I could teach you lessons no school contains, impart unimaginable strength, power to defeat all the enemies in your path. It would be simple to instruct you, but it would be so much easier if I was by your side so you didn't have to come back to this place for every lesson.'_

It was impossible, but the juicy fruit he dangled held no temptation for the bubbly girl.

"More lessons? Meh, that sounds like too much hard work."

' _But… what if I could show you the secret to eternal life?'_

Nora giggled. "You weren't kidding, you really do sound old."

Watching incredulously- for the first time in centuries, as his offering was rebuked so outright for- what? For this, this-

"Nora?"

"Coming Ren!"

The branches quivered with the shrill cry that was worse than the murder of Nevermore which roosted in the forest ever could be. Watching her traipse off into the underbrush was perhaps the better deal for the seducer.

But still, she was a person.

' _Wait! I-I could just_ _ **give**_ _you power! Anything you desire! Just get me out of here!'_

"Later Mr. Weird-Gem-Tree-Snake-Thing!"

Such blatant disregard-

' _Get back here you ignoramus! So help me, this will be the only time you ever turn your back on me for the next time I will strike you down so swiftly and mercilessly that you will never know what happened! No- No, no, no... If you dare defy me I will make you_ _ **suffer**_ _! Your school, your friends, I will tear them all down in front of your eyes so slowly if will make this past millennium look like a mercy! Air-headed strumpet, I will make you rue the day you denied Oro-'_

But she was already gone, and so was the name all but forgotten by time.

' _You're the first person that's found me in twenty years! Don't leave me!'_

Silence.

Except for the bird which mimicked the girl's gaiety. Alighting on the branch, it leered down at the shiny trinket.

' _Go away.'_

Though considering it in much the same way, he remembered that he'd been proud once. Too proud to stoop to talking to birds.

Unbothered by this command, the bird cocked its head quizzically before deciding that it wasn't edible and therefore not worth interest. It took off, departing the idyllic garden which was once again peaceful without the girl's noisy tromping, long since petered out.

Sighing as the gooey white streak it left behind slowly dribbled down the once shiny-face, he mused that the girl might have been wiser than she looked.

Immortality was overrated.


	4. Paleozoic: Ordovician

**UPDATED: 11/29/18**

* * *

 **I can't remember when the last update was so… *gathers up pages and flings them out the 7** **th** **story window*. Here you go. Have fun sorting this out.**

* * *

Finding Naruto turned out not to be that difficult. Apart from the obvious trajectory- not to mention the even _more_ obvious swath of destruction he caused upon descent, Ruby had been made aware of a faint but distinct sensation which drew her like a bloodhound right to where he was lodged hilt-deep into a granite boulder.

The hard part came later when extracting him. And then when she had to explain to her companions why she shouted his name before freaking out.

' _For what it's worth, I thought it was a pretty smooth cover.'_ The hitch in her throat said otherwise, until she smothered it with the memory of discomfiture.

" _Yeah right. Who announces their attack_ _ **after**_ _doing it? Plus, do you really think they're going to believe I just randomly happen to know a word in a dead language?"_ She flinched as it felt like a roomful of eyes were upon her. Though in fact most were closed, the others seeking something-anything to distract them from the boredom of the lecture, and not necessarily looking at her. _"They're going to think I'm nuts!"_

' _Who cares? Look Ruby, part of this life was always going to be learning how to roll with the punches. You did a great job- with all of it. And I'm sorry that I've made things this difficult.'_

Unable to disguise her mortification, Ruby hid her blanch with the sturdy concealment of the desk. _"Without you we never would have won!"_

' _Meh, I doubt that. I'm sure you would have been fine.'_ Ruby had yet to learn just how terrible a liar he was, and so his vote of confidence rang null.

" _Were you even there?! Did you see everything you blew up?! It was all like: Kerfloom!, Neeearooow, Brang! And the Nevermore was like: Pakawow…!"_

Rather than disenchant him, Ruby's childlike enthusiasm only bolstered his image of her in his mind. One that was truer than life.

And rather than dishearten her, his laughter assuaged her trepidations and she let a smile play across her concealed lips.

' _Yeah, I did kind of go a bit overboard, didn't I?'_ Noticing and sympathizing with his partner's fatigue, he completed the yawn she tried to stifle. _'Yeah, I really did, huh. Maybe we should tone it down next time you use "Maelstrom", ne?'_

Ruby agreed wholeheartedly, already thinking on ways to restrain and better use the latent power Naruto had stored within. That, and a better name for their new tandem trick.

' _Great. So I'm just gonna take a nap now. You got this right?'_

" _Wait, you're not going to help me?"_ This fear did manage to perk her up a bit, as she wasn't sure how she'd survive Professor Port's class without someone there to at least keep her awake.

' _Don't worry, I trust in you.'_ This time, his sincerity was blemished by the smirk she could feel dancing a jig on the back of her head. _'Besides, academics aren't really my forte. Good luck! Ciao!'_

She tried to recall him, but it was of no use. Just as she could feel his physical container wedged between buttonholes of her school uniform, she could clearly feel the slumbering conscience draped somewhere between her mind and her skull like a mental shawl.

The sensation wasn't actually all that unpleasant, or hard to ignore for that matter, just like that faint kite-string tug which lead her to him before. It simply made her notice how much _**more**_ she noticed with Naruto. Not to mention how much harder it now was to tune out the droning teacher at the front of the room.

Not even trying to stifle the groan, she let her overburdened head flop the rest of the way down on the unyielding desk with a thump.

No one seemed to notice the uncomfortable sound. Just as she hadn't noticed the surreptitious glances being sent her way since the start of class.

Jaune merely thought his interest was because of her impressive display during the initiation. And he was right in a way.

Blake was more cognizant of a greater conspiracy, though didn't care much for uncovering it. Preferring to let sleeping dogs lay- while she could at least.

Fully aware of her own scrutinizing glare directed towards the face-down girl, Weiss dutifully ignored all the logical inconsistencies with their Professor's tall tales in favor of the greater discrepancy which was Ruby Rose. Sure, the girl was skilled- that much was undeniable. But just as irrefutable was her total lack of other qualifications making her leader of their new team which included Yang and Blake.

" _She doesn't deserve to be our team captain. Why? Because_ _ **I**_ _should be in charge. I've worked too long and too hard to be usurped by a juvenile girl who hardly deserves to be here. Why? Because I actually had to struggle to get here. I know and can appreciate the importance of the position. Whereas she just thinks this is some kind of fantasy fairy-tale. Why? Because she's naïve. Clinging to that paltry gem that her daddy probably got her like it's so important. Those with nothing will always seek fame and fortune. Only those like Pyrrha and myself who know how hollow those things are can aspire to what is truly important."_

Unaware that her hand was roving over the silver bracelet worn for good luck on the first day of classes. And blind to the tinkling voice at the back of her head, refuting, chiming, chanting:

 _Illogical_.

* * *

"Not a team lead by _**you**_."

 _Not a team lead by_ _ **you**_ _._

Not a team lead by her.

Could she really blame Weiss for feeling that way? What had she really done to earn her place here, let alone the responsibility yoked on her shoulders?

Everything since that fateful night in Vale felt overwhelming. An uncontrollable downhill slide that was rapidly picking up speed into an inevitable crash at rock bottom.

Was it really that bad? Maybe this bout of depression was due to a sugar crash. What had she eaten today? She couldn't remember. Just like she could hardly remember what else was said during their brief confrontation other than the singularly harsh stipulation.

Falling, sliding down against the wall as it truly felt like all the energy had left her. It was a long way to lunch, a long way fighting an uphill battle if she was still going to try and make this work.

"I probably don't belong here, huh?"

' _Don't give me that crap.'_

She flinched at the voice which was foreign and harsh, not to mention startling in the empty hallway. Looking outside for a mouth to blame for the 'dirty word. She must have been more out of it than she thought.

" _You don't think it's true?"_

' _No. I already told you that.'_

Lowering her head at the admonishment so that her eyes rested on the weathered tile floor and her chin rested on the thin leather neck strap. She scooted her legs in and hugged her knees, for lack of anything else to hold.

" _I thought you were just teasing me."_

' _Why would you think that?'_ A sudden change in tone to bewilderment. Without a face it felt dizzying. _'Well, maybe I_ _ **was**_ _teasing you a little bit. That's just part of my character- a part that survived, anyway.'_ Did it survive through him, or him through it? Irony and satire had been his only friends for a long time. _'But I do mean what I say, Ruby. I trust in you. There is a reason for that, just as I am sure the Old Man had a reason to bring you here and one for making you team captain.'_

" _Yeah?"_ Hope sprung up like an Iris on a rainy day.

' _Yeah.'_ The blinder cast over her conscience had become a blanket without her knowing, taking the place of her absent cloak and enveloping her in a comforting warmth. _'Weiss will too, eventually. You just have to give her time to see it like we do.'_

" _So, you heard that, huh?"_ Thinking he had been asleep during the argument made his lack of comment more bearable. If he had been aware, why did he wait until now?

' _Well, I could have guessed. But your emotional state is pretty… exposed right now.'_ The warmth became oppressive as she blushed in chagrin- for doubting him or for his phrasing, she couldn't determine. _'Remember I said that you'd have to roll with the punches. I'm sure your combat instructors made sure you could in the middle of a battle, but it applies here because life's its own kind of battle. Trust me, I know.'_

She couldn't possibly fathom how, but she did. Amidst the recent memories playing like a flip-book, someone slipped in the image of little blond boy who was far lonelier than she could imagine on her own. So fast and so much in tune with the melancholy that it snuck beneath her notice until it had flitted away.

' _You were so excited when you first found out you got accepted. That's one of the things that drew me to you, and you shouldn't let that change. School's where you're supposed to mess-up, so you don't have to do it in the real world. I just wish someone had told_ _ **me**_ _that way back when.'_

Hearing the heavily laced dismay, Ruby could not help but let out a titter. It sounded loud after the silent conversation, and she hastily slapped a hand over her mouth which covered the smile playing on her lips.

' _It's your dream to become a great huntress, right? That's an admirable, but also a tough goal. It's okay to have concerns, but don't let them hold you back. Remember: a goal should scare you a little, and excite you a lot.'_

Hand still clamped over her mouth, it did nothing to curtail the snort which burst forth.

" _You sound like a fortune cookie."_

' _Uh… well…funny you should mention that…'_ The very human embarrassment at being found out did nothing to detract from her opinion of him. Instead, breaking the illusion that he was something more than an object of unimaginable power and less than a fallible person. _'*Ahem*. Well, the old man running the Dust-Shop also had a restaurant and liked to collect the fortunes left by the customers. There were a few gems of advice in there. Is it really a bad thing?'_

" _No."_ She said with certainty, picking herself up and patting down her skirt. _"There's no such thing as a bad cookie."_

The temporary victory of confidence over doubt caused her to neglect a few important facts, distracted by the heady feeling the purge left in its wake.

"Oh no!" Hands slapped either cheek to keep her head in the right direction. "I'm soooo late!"

Recognizing only one of those important facts, for the second time that day she flew through the school's passageways which were conveniently empty because everyone else was already in class.

While still missing the other, itself content to watch the scene from the shadows with a keen but detached interest while cradling a mug of cocoa.

For the man who claimed to have made so many mistakes, it was a weight off his mind to know that this wasn't one of them.

Neither of them were.

"I'm glad you found a good one."

The whisper to himself drowned by a swig of the warm liquid that had for years failed to thaw his frozen heart. That object hardened like stone to guard against the inevitable disappointment humanity faithfully delivered.

Was it foolish to think that this would do the trick, that it could break the mold? Too early to hope- or perhaps too late.

Hardly. Hope was eternal.

* * *

Statuesque, she sat there on the edge of her bed, staring at the white wall like alabaster- like her skin, like her thoughts- blank.

Surely at some point she had been human, right?

What had happened?

Disturbed that she couldn't recall- afraid to, afraid to move, to think, to remember.

" _Why?"_

She had been seconds away from confronting Professor Port after class, and it was there under the lintel that her affliction struck. Her prepared diatribe caught in her throat like a mud-clod as she looked out at the open balcony. Port was standing right there with his back to the door, and she turned around, letting the extraordinary current whisk her away.

" _Why did I turn back?"_ Avoiding her best opportunity to submit a complaint was not conducive to her plans. _"I have a right to argue this unfair decision- more of a right than that childish brat. So-?"_

' _Why? Why ask, when it is already known?'_ She stiffened in denial, showing that her mortification was an illusion. _'The answer: because we are afraid of the truth. It is hurtful, and so we build up a cocoon to protect us.'_

" _I don't need my family name to promote me. I have earned the right on my own."_ Real clothes for a real girl. Accoutrements, jewelry fit for a princess suddenly feeling excessive, gaudy.

' _We are most vulnerable when undergoing change.'_

" _The outside is dangerous, Weiss. Your bones were built for worldly riches, not meant for the harshness of life."_ Rebuked at first, this unsolicited advice played through her mind without irony. Was this the truth she was afraid of?

' _Must break, in order to change, to evolve.'_

" _That's why I'm here, right? To improve, to smash the frozen chrysalis_ _ **he**_ _built for me."_ Sprout wings and fly far, far away.

' _Correct.'_

A crack appeared in that stony façade.

" _Why am I acting like this then? Because I'm afraid to admit that I'm not perfect?"_

' _Logical.'_

" _Why? Because if I admit I'm not perfect, that makes me no better than him?"_

' _Illogical.'_

" _\- Because I'm_ _ **not**_ _afraid to admit I'm imperfect. I want to get better, so that I can correct his arrogant mistakes."_

' _Logical.'_

" _Why? Because he's ruined the family name?"_

' _Illogical.'_

" _\- Because he's a cruel man. And I don't want to be the same."_

' _Logical.'_

" _Why? Because he tried to deny me my freedom, along with so many others. And that infuriates me."_

' _Logical.'_

" _Why? Because life is precious, and it isn't life so long as we're stagnant in a cage or frozen like a bug under glass."_

' _Logical.'_

" _And so…"_

Choosing to stand, to stretch her legs and join the world of the living. Watching as the door cautiously opened, and the catalyst for her metamorphosis enter, laden with a heavy stack of books as tall as she.

Weiss sighed and moved next to her ambitious captain.

"Here, let me help you with those."

" _And so, I at least owe her the chance to live her life too, right?"_

' _Logical.'_

An eyebrow sprouted over the edge of a novel, presiding over the scene with only mild interest. As if it were no different than the words under her nose, or some peculiar clouds passing by far out of reach.

Watching with a lazy satisfaction, Blake was glad that this troublesome situation seemed to work itself out. For now.

* * *

Weeks would pass and eventually the tectonic shifts would die down. Tremors from the collision of worlds petered out and left them able to stand steady on their feet once again. Constructs that were built up during this orogeny were solidified, and precarious links were broken before they became a danger looming high over everyone's head.

However, the world doesn't just work on these violent bouts of catastrophism. It is always moving, slowly, surely, in ways that are at once too large and too small to notice.

More attuned to this scale measured in eons and epochs than the mortal coils he surrounded himself with, Naruto made sure to keep at least one ear to the ground during and after the transition. This was his self-appointed duty, his only real identity with the loss of his flesh and blood body. He had been waiting what felt like centuries- in actuality, scores of millennia- for the opportunity to come along and be of use once again.

Sadly, he was still as impatient and excitable as ever. And if anything, solitude has exacerbated his need for interaction as it built up throughout the ages without sufficient release. This manifested in bursts of uncurtailable conversation inside his partner's head, so that she too could not keep it contained for risk of drowning in verbiage. The comments transmitted through her mouth would not help to assimilate her with the group. But, in all fairness, is wasn't like she was much better on her own.

Naruto was- if not a fountain of knowledge- a sprinkler of obscure information which helped as often as it fell flat. The fact that he tried would abet Ruby's anxieties, making her feel more comfortable with her own peculiarities.

Even if she felt that her so-called _partner_ was hiding things from her.

Even though he was.

He just didn't want to overwhelm her so soon with conspiracies both contemporary and ancient. Maybe after he had something substantial to report, instead of hunting after ghosts.

But for some, the ghosts were already there, and very much real. Jaune had been haunted by them for weeks now, whispering in his head at all hours and keeping him up at night. Always reminding him how weak he was, how he was powerless to silence them.

' _Go ahead. Show me otherwise. Cast me away like a bad dream. You can't, can you?_

No, no he couldn't. Every time he attempted to, a pressure would smother him and his muscles would seize making him unable to move, unable to even breath until he perished the notion. Until then he would be drowning at the bottom of a fathomless sea with a single, narrow band of light to show the way out. Bells chiming: survive, survive, survive…

' _That's all there is. You thought you accomplished something by sneaking into the big leagues. But now you've seen a world you can't un-see, and there's only one way out…'_

Jaune's eyes moved from staring disinterestedly down at his soggy and untouched hamburger over to the pristine utensils lying next to it. He lingered on the perfunctorily-sharp knife for a tad too long, staring at his gaunt and disturbed appearance in the reflection.

' _Oh ho, ho, ho. You think that's an option? Heh, alright, go ahead. A knife's a lot lighter than that sword you can barely lift, and it's such a short cut. Something you're used to I'm sure, Ha! You might be able to cheat your way through life, boy, but never death. Never death._

The thought hadn't actually passed through his mind until that point. But now that it was given a voice, it was joyfully exclaiming its virtues, sultrily whispering its easy pleasure.

On its own, his hand reached for the blade…

' _-But, be warned, if you think I'm bad, consider this: I am but a baby demon whereas in Hell awaits the real thing. Not like these mindless beasts you failed to slay, but true Monsters.'_

This gave the boy pause, reconsidering the action he hadn't given a thought to the first time around. His fear paralyzing him, governing his every action.

'… _Of course, I would be lying if I told you that there weren't demons amongst the living. The worst of all which is man! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha…!'_

It couldn't be any worse if that blade had cut him, the words tearing him asunder from tip to toe and the ground underneath. He was falling, chasing that laughter down to the darkest pits of a fiery eternity.

"Are you alright, Jaune?"

He jumped at the voice like a yell, the hand like a blade on his shoulder.

Ruby was leaning over him, in what was to him uncomfortably close. Not considering his actions, only knowing he needed to escape from her penetrating gaze.

"Y-yeah, I'm fine." He asserted, jerking his way out from underneath only to bump into the person next to him. Whirling around to find his partner who had been sitting next to him for who knew how long. "S-sorry…"

It was then that he noticed the rest of the table was looking at him in much the same way, and he felt as stifled as before. Trapped, with no way out.

"Are you sure? Because you look sort of… not alright."

If he were honest, he really didn't. Hardly sleeping, hardly eating since the day that voice entered his life. His beanstalk frame had withered to a walking husk and his moppish hair looked wrung out and stowed wet, drooping like the rest of him.

The bluntness though was a slap in his face, forcing him to contort it into a smile. "Me? Nah, I'm fine, see?" Himself feeling as silly as he probably looked with a clown's grin stapled cheek to cheek. Hopefully it would make them laugh and forget their concern. It wasn't like he was suicidal or anything- at least, he didn't think he was…

"It's Cardin, isn't it?"

Unable to keep up the act in the face of genuine confusion, he shot his partner a quizzical expression.

"What, Cardin? No, why would he be bothering me?"

As the group of first years recounted the known-bully's litany of trespasses, Jaune found himself stumped. He honestly had hardly noticed the hooligan's actions in comparison to his own personal demon.

"Yeah, but he's that way towards everyone!"

Serendipity cried out, drawing their attention to the devil himself enacting this prophecy.

"Ow! Please stop, it hurts!"

The plaintiff begging from the girl failed to stir Jaune. Blatant though it was, Cardin and his goon's treatment of Faunus was hardly anything new to the world of Remnant- not even to their lunchroom. Pity would hardly help the rabbit-eared girl in any case, even if he had some left to spare.

"Ha! I told you they're real! What a freak!" Cardin's Right-Hand tugged at the girl's Faunus traits, still as if they were nothing but a prop.

Jaune's heart raced as around him the table became saturated in that familiar pressure. In this context, he understood it to be weaponized animosity. Though not directed at him, he still found he could not move.

"People like him shouldn't be here." Blake was the spokeswoman for their vitriol, her arms carefully folded to suppress their intention to harm. "They're a disgrace to huntsmen."

But Jaune heard something else: All the unspoken words, the daggers between lines. He felt the restrained actions channeled through his bones, all the while that unrelenting voice goaded him onward, upward.

' _People like him shouldn't be here… a disgrace… people like him shouldn't be… people like him…shouldn't be…'_

Logic and reason held others in their seats, knowing it would be unproductive to confront the bully. Others had to be restrained more physically. Hands both seen and unseen kept Blake sitting while it was all Naruto could do to keep Ruby from leaping in defense of the poor Faunus girl- It was all he could do to keep himself from exploding in that same justified rage.

All for naught.

"Stop it."

Heeding the command in disbelief, Cardin and his teammates turned towards the interloper who even then could not look anyone in the eye.

"Stop what? We're just having a little bit of fun, right?" Asking his cohorts rather than the Faunus girl who looked even more afraid now that someone was standing up for her.

Carefree laughter sloughed over his bowed shoulders, but he simply bobbed with the waves.

"Just leave her alone, Cardin." Neither bark nor bite, it was almost as if he hadn't spoke at all.

"What was that?" With a half-step, Cardin moved himself so that his shadow fell over the do-gooder. "You got a death-wish or something, Jauney-boy?"

Jaune smirked diffidently. "Funny you should ask that…"

But this whisper didn't carry any level of threat, either. Jaune wasn't really ready to throw in the towel just yet. That glittering blade yet lay on the table, never making it into his clenched fist.

"Oh, we got a tough guy here?" Unfortunately, Cardin heard the almost-silent defiance and took another step forward, juxtaposing his impressive bulk against the waiflike teen. "So what's it gonna be, Jauney-boy? You trying to be her white-knight or something?"

Jaune joined in on their continued guffaws. It _was_ laughable. If he were not stooped, Jaune would stand just above Cardin on a tape-measure. But in their fighting abilities, he wasn't even on the same scale, as attested by his unbroken string of losses during combat class.

"No, I'm no hero." Raising his bowed head made Cardin flinch as he stared into dilated and pale-blue eyes which seemed to unearth all his insecurities. "I'm weak. More than that, I'm a loser. I know I can't hope to do anything. But still… I don't have a choice."

Backed into a corner, figuratively and literally as the rest of team CRDL repositioned themselves around the impending confrontation. There was always only one way out.

"Huh." Cardin looked mildly impressed by this declaration, crossing his arms and nodding his head condescendingly with a jutted chin. "Alright."

Belying his girth, Cardin's strike came too fast for Jaune to even interpret until well after it impacted his cheek and he was sent stumbling into the adjacent table. Not even registering the pain in his dizziness, he would have been sent all the way to the floor if his arms hadn't caught on the wooden bench.

Automatically, Jaune's long leg shot out backwards with its only direction being fight or flight. Even though it wasn't aimed, his sneakers managed to sneak in under Cardin's kneecap, earning a grunt of discomfort but little else.

"Boy, you _are_ weak." Cardin sneered, proceeding to show the boy what a real kick could be like.

Jaune recoiled, only to be stopped by the unyielding oak table, his ribs absorbing the brunt of the blow.

It hadn't occurred to either to use their Aura for protection. For different reasons, both found it pointless. Cardin because he didn't think he would need it against someone so demonstratively incapable of hurting him. Jaune, because he really wasn't thinking.

The only way out was up. But as soon as he tried to stand from the bench, he was knocked down again. Again, and again, and again, and again, and again. Every time he tried to rise up on his own two feet, someone was there to knock him down a few pegs. Even his own family was like this, their attempts to soften the blow worse than the fists raining down on him now. This pain was fleeting at least, though the bruises and broken nose would likely last for several months afterward.

" _If I survive, that is."_ Jaune thought morbidly, half wondering if this was his attempt at assisted suicide.

' _That's your choice, brat. It was always your choice, not to rely on others to save you. So what will you do now? It won't get any easier from here on out, I guarantee you. There's gonna be a lot more mean bastards than this punk beating the shit out of you. He and I are just the tip of the iceberg submerged in an ocean of shit. So what'll it be? Give up now, or fight tooth and nail for this travesty called life?'_

Jaune wanted to answer, but the blows raining down upon him took his breath away. He knew that in his weakened state this beating might prove fatal. Every moment his vision was fading to black, and the cries and jeers of the crowd they had gathered were rapidly becoming white noise on the edge of his conscious.

Somewhere in between his mind had become gray, unfeeling, uncaring of it all. It wasn't like he did it for the Faunus girl, and he certainly hadn't become a hunter to prove anything to his family who demeaned him with their love. Always it was for himself, only now coming to accept that he wasn't worth it.

"Jaune!" Through the ocean above him he heard it, calling. He peaked out through his eggplant eye and saw the imploring face of his teammate pushing against the mob. "Get up! Please!"

Pyrrha. She deserved better than him.

' _Aye. She does.'_ Devoid of the disappointment he so expected, replaced by a wistfulness he never would have guessed. _'But for some unfathomable reason, she_ _ **wants**_ _you.'_

Swollen eyes snapped open just in time to see the meaty fist headed for his face. No room to dodge- not that he'd be able to anyway. He swung a block with his right arm- for all that was worth. Slapped the opposing fist barely to the left.

Knuckles checked off the corner of his forehead. It was better than a straight blow to his crushed nose, at least. And better yet, there was no follow-up.

There weren't any more blows, in fact, replaced by an unearthly stillness. There was no more noise, either, voices goading the fight petered off to leave the lunchroom in a church-like hush.

"-The fuck?"

Broken by Cardin as he stole the words right out of Jaune's bleeding mouth. Both looked at the knife Jaune hadn't picked up which was sticking out of the other boy's forearm.

It was surreal. He had been certain that he left the utensil on the table. And such a clean stab there wasn't even any bleeding yet, which added to the bizarre nature.

Thinking along these same lines, Cardin reached over and pulled out the blade with a detached fascination. Pulling it was like a cork on a cask as a burgundy liquid spewed forth. A few drops splattered across the slack-jawed face of his teammate standing off to the side, and the horrified rabbit Faunus whom he was guarding.

Reality started back up again.

The cries of spectators turned shrill and panicked. Cardin's eyes rolled up in his head and he fell straight to the ground, almost toppling onto Jaune who was frozen in dismay.

"What have I done?"

"You done fucked up, asshole!"

Cardin's teammate, Sky Lark, informed him with an infuriated cry and a haymaker aimed at the back of his head.

"Oh no you don't!"

No longer restrained by the conventions of a one-on-one fight, those sitting on the sidelines used this interference as their long-awaited excuse.

Jumping at the chance, his partner easily intercepted the would-be sneak attack. Using every scrap of her Amazonian might, Pyrrha wrapped her arms around the member of CRDL and threw him across the room and into the stone walls.

From the shadows Blake pounced, handily and brutally cutting down Russel Thrush who had been attempting to enter the fray using the innocent Faunus girl as a shield.

Seeing all his comrades fall so easily and having a bit more between his ears than his teammates, Dove Bronzewing weighed his chances of just slinking off unnoticed in the spooked crowd. Moments later, he was left on the floor staring up at the dangerous smirk of team RWBY's captain. **Much** later he would reflect that he had gotten off relatively easily with only a broken ankle.

No one was so lucky when the lot suddenly found themselves pinned to the far wall by an invisible force. Aggressors and vigilantes alike, all of whom stared down in fear at the deathly serious face of Glynda Goodwitch who had not even bothered to announce her presence.

"Professor Port, could you please take Mr. Winchester straight to the infirmary." No question to her calmly dictated command, only a singular animation out of a sea of background characters as the ruddy man whisked the unconscious lad away. "I trust that none of the rest of you have injuries that can't wait until after your visit with the headmaster."

Once again without asking, the injured were forced to bite their tongues and groan an agreement. Resigning the pain underneath an uncurtailable fear.

Except for Jaune, whose pain had nothing in comparison to dismay. Having just resolved to fight for his right to exist, it seemed that the pitifully ephemeral life was already at an end.

' _Relax brat.'_ Talking to him like an old friend, Jaune felt the need to rail against his tormentor regardless of his current predicament. _'You can scream all you want once this over, but for now try to keep calm. It was self-defense no matter how you look at it. The headmaster of this place will know that. Even if he does seem like a sniveling pacifist, he can't criticize you without being a hypocrite.'_

That was enough, if not to calm Jaune, then to redirect his energies into the mystery the voice had handed him. Wanting to rebuke it at first like everything else he had been told, he had to admit that the voice never lied. Rather than frighten him with the possibilities, to his surprise, it excited him.

' _You finally decided to get stronger, right? Well just listen to me and I'll get you there. Already you've taken the first step.'_

" _You… you set me up, didn't you?"_ Though he asked, Jaune already knew and was merely wondering how to feel about it.

' _Maybe I did, maybe I didn't.'_ Shark's teeth interposed on a Cheshire grin made Jaune shiver weightlessly. _'Hardly matters now as I've told you before: it was always your choice. Whatever I did was inconsequential.'_

This time he was unable to hold in his indignation, but it came out instead as a cry of surprise as the lot of them were unceremoniously unshackled from the wall.

"Teams RWBY, JNPR and CRDL, follow me to the headmaster's office."

Ironically, being subject to the intense pressure of killing intent for days on end made Jaune all but immune to the icy atmosphere cast by Glynda Goodwitch. Regardless, he followed like a beaten mongrel, not ready to push his luck again. At least, not with her.

' _I also told you that it's not going to get easier from here. I don't expect that you'll get expelled for this, but it's still gonna make things tough. You'll probably all get detention at the very least, and they'll be keeping a closer eye on you from here on, no doubt. Which will make training a bit harder, but still doable.'_

" _Training?!"_ Jaune blanched, swooned. Not even fully aware when he was caught in the arms of Pyrrha and Yang marching by his side.

' _Damn right. You're even weaker than you were before, so we got a long road ahead of us to get you back into shape. I'm not going to let you waste this opportunity.'_

As strange as it sounded, Jaune found himself agreeing. He didn't want to waste any opportunity that might come out of his grievous mistake, and looked forward to this possibility with equal parts fear and exhilaration.

' _Which reminds me. Your first lesson. Eight points: Larynx, spine, lungs, liver, jugular, subclavian artery, kidneys, heart. Next time, if you've only got one blow, make it count.'_

He probably shouldn't have, he probably couldn't have with his body as weak as it was, and his face so rearranged he'd need to eat out of a straw for the next week.

But even then, Jaune laughed.

* * *

The man who was supposed to be as stalwart as stone, supposed to be the ridged pillar upon which Beacon and the rest of the free world balanced, was quavering.

Untypically, Ozpin sat behind his desk in quiet contemplation of his history of mistakes. Oft fond of claiming he had made more of them than anyone living (which was true), never one to linger on them for longer than necessary. Each he would like to think he learned from, taken their lessons to heart so the grief would not be wasted.

Why then, despite his wisdom, did he continue to make them? Was he in the midst of one now?

' _Doubt can never truly be cured. We take precautions as best we know how, based on our own experience and that of whom we think we can trust.'_

Having done just that, Ozpin wondered why trepidations continued to plague him. Within his self-made kingdom meticulously laid brick by brick, he should have been a god. And yet, continually felt like the janitor.

' _The problem begins and ends with other people. Knowing who to trust with that responsibility can be difficult, and a conflict of ideals can get… messy.'_

Another war must be avoided at all costs. If only people weren't so fickle- more like Grimm, driven by primal instinct. Things would be so much more predictable.

' _Then they would be nothing less than monsters with the sole purpose being survival. Eat, sleep, procreate for no other purpose but to further existence- not life worth living by any stretch.'_

Frustrated that he needed reminding of something so basic, Ozpin's brow furrowed deep grooves in his otherwise ageless face. Maybe the problem was that he was getting too old, senility finally coming for its claim long overdue.

' _We can't afford that just yet. There's too much left to do, decisions to be made.'_

Indeed. And he wasn't any closer on this one.

' _Should such powerful tools be left in the hands of children?'_

He had known of Jaune's serendipitous find since the first day and had simply sat back to watch. Was it merely irresponsibility on his part, or a morbid fascination to see how the grossly unqualified youth handled the pressure? Whilst denying the latter, he could not deny the spindly fingers of ice creeping through his chest and ensnaring his heart.

' _That is guilt, knowing that these are neither tools nor are they children.'_

Wasn't Glynda constantly reminding him of this? Perhaps a part of him was still bemoaning the loss of his own innocence, so long ago.

' _That's the thing about growing old. You keep aging, but the students who come and go stay the same age. Bringing with them fresh philosophies, reinvigorated motivation.'_

One of the reasons he started the school, not only to educate the future generation, but to be enlightened in return. Inspired by their pure outlooks and beautiful ideals.

'… _not to mention their_ _ **gorgeous**_ _bodies!'_

Also untypically, Ozpin spewed his lukewarm beverage all over the scattered paperwork on his desk, cursing as he rushed around the live-in office for a towel. Meanwhile, other curses ran in concert.

' _Damn it, I knew from the beginning you were going to turn this into something perverted, Jiraiya.'_ Timeless tone of admonishment that could cut lesser men to pieces was nothing to the one who staunchly identified as a Super-Pervert.

' _What did you expect? It can't be an accident that all the huntresses here are_ _ **babes**_ _. It is demonstratively unfair that I hardly have a chance to pee- to_ _ **admire**_ _their physique being stuck in this tower 24/7.'_

' _Ignoring the impropriety for the moment, that sort of thing seems especially useless given our status.'_

' _Hey, you deal with this your way, I have mine. I'm just annoyed that now that I'm finally_ _ **rock hard**_ _I can't do anything!'_

With an undignified yelp Ozpin banged the back of his head on the unforgiving desk whilst trying to lift both himself and the conversation from the filth.

' _Enough with the pointless salaciousness.'_ Hardly embarrassed, their company was long since immured to the man's eccentrics. Rather, the speaker was indignant that Ozpin wasn't more so. _'This is hardly the time for your antics.'_

"Thank you, Utatane-dono." For what it was worth, Ozpin tried to straighten himself with dignity while nursing the throbbing back of his head. At the very least, it managed to overshadow the tightness in his chest. "I requested your opinion on the matter because I feel that I truly require council from a different perspective."

' _Please, Ozpin-san, call me Koharu. There is hardly any need for decorum these days.'_ Never knowing the woman in life, he could not place a face to that impassive tone which revealed none of her disposition, nor indeed, her motivations. _'I think you are being too lax with security. Call them whatever you wish, there is no denying that in untrained hands our kind can be a danger. Letting the students retain influence with them would be criminally negligent- without supervision.'_

"I take it then, that you would not be opposed if I confiscate all of the crystals." Stated like a fait accompli. "And in your objective opinion, do you believe this is both a wise and morally justified course of action, Jiraiya-sama?"

Trying to confine the wily man to an answer that would leave little room for _additions._

' _Hmph. Morality has nothing to do with it.'_

"Excuse me?"

' _You're trying to write a new chapter to history and it's either going to be well written or poorly written. Moral and immoral are just things ascribed afterwards by critics. You want to stop the cycle of hatred between humans and Faunus, you want to make the right decision with regards to the people under your care. That's an admirable goal, so you shouldn't let things like morality stop you from doing what is right.'_

Not what anyone was expecting from the usually lighthearted man. His response forced the room on a trip into the dark past. A darker time than even the eons spent trapped in caves underground.

'… _That being said, this isn't a dime novel. It's real life and these aren't your characters to play with. They're people with their own morals and opinions which you will never be able to fully dictate, nor should you try. Let them live their own lives, make their own mistakes and help them out the best you can coming from a place of experience.'_

"I see." Feeling every year culminated in that room, Ozpin sat back into his chair and looked up to the relentless clockwork above his head. The glistening gems like stars overhead moving it all. Themselves appearing fixed and immutable, but in reality, were nexuses of unfathomable life and wisdom. One winked, and he turned to it. Its pale violet hue unassuming amidst the field of brilliant pleochroism, but like the North Star, never failing to draw his eye. "And what do you think?"

The disembodied voice was unplaceable like Koharu's, but also nothing like it. Whereas hers hid emotions behind a studious mask perfected over a very long life, this one was timeless and ephemeral in the same breath. Heartfelt emotions blossomed with every whisper and withered with the silence. The only thing Ozpin was certain of was that it had once been a woman, and that she had been beautiful.

' _What I think… I think that nothing ever changes. The same people are still locked in the same arguments over the same conflicts. Showing that despite time, experience, evolution, we remain inescapably shackled to our nature. Thus, the question becomes not what actions we can take to change our situation, but why we should do anything at all?'_

Ugliness within such beauty, sobriety from the reveler, cruelty within the guise of assistance. The fact that he was surprised by this only lent credence to this life's failings. Yet, it reeked of sophistry.

"Why then? As one who clings to life yourself, what is your answer?"

Eldritch laughing like a fairy's requiem filled the chamber, and Ozpin was tempted to recant his assumption.

' _I'm hoping to find out.'_

* * *

"I'm telling you, he's going to be fine." Rubbing his own patchwork face, the school nurse pretended to review the clipboard to assuage the nervous first-years who had crowded into his infirmary. "The damage is mostly superficial. Your friend has a surprisingly resilient body."

Not to mention an impressive well of Aura which was at that very moment stitching up the cuts and abating swelling. It was in fact the reason the nurse himself was still there, fascinated by a level of precision healing he'd never before witnessed. If this were a Semblance, he may very well be looking at the start of the boy's medical career.

If it wasn't, he might be looking at the end of his own, for he still didn't have a good explanation as to what was happening. Such as it was, clearly suffering from malnutrition and scrawny to boot, the boy in all rights should have been dead, or at least in a coma. That he wasn't, and instead was mumbling responses through puffy lips to his fellow students' inquiries was nothing short of a miracle.

Or maybe a testament of will. Bolstered by the gaggle of well-wishers who flooded his infirmary and harried his nerves with their barely-restrained concern. Not that he could blame them- or do anything about it as long as visiting hours were in effect and the patient was conscious.

"Keep it down or I'll be forced to kick you out. There are other patients in here, you know?" They did. It was hard to ignore the members of CRDL licking their wounds the next bay over. The nurse sighed as he couldn't ignore them either. "I'll be right back. I won't be far, so if anything changes, someone will let me know."

Without any verbal acknowledgement the Nurse left to tend the other patients, not worried in the slightest that his instructions would be followed if need be. Equally confident that they wouldn't. That Jaune Arc had a guardian angel looking after him, or something.

'Or something' was probably the operative term.

' _He's going to fine, Ruby. I promise.'_ Naruto reiterated, feeling very much like the nurse who had just left. But also, feeling very much like the person he was trying to reassure. _'You're not talking. Are you upset with me?'_ He probed after no answer was forthcoming.

Yes, she was upset. With Naruto, for telling her not to intervene? Or with herself, for obeying without question?

' _You felt it. When I transmitted Jaune's emotions, you knew his conflict, as well as his resolve.'_ Rebutting her unguarded thoughts, and hoping not to exacerbate things. _'That was just a fraction of what he was really feeling. Maybe it was even too much to expect you to handle, and you're getting the backlash. I can endure it because of, who- well… because of_ _ **what**_ _I am.'_ The truth in not so many words. Not simply because his new 'body' did not respond to the chemical and electrical ques as easily as flesh and blood, but because he was long since used to such feelings. She did not notice the slip. _'I was wrong to ask you not to help your friend. I'm sorry.'_

Ruby chewed on her lip until it was mimicking the color of the patient's. No one else seemed to notice, not least Jaune who was thoroughly distracted by his teammates with Nora animatedly extolling his 'badassness' by miming stabbing movements.

" _No, you weren't wrong."_ Watching the blond chuckle in response, only to wince at the action. _"Jaune's tough, tougher than anyone gives him credit for."_ Lately, when he'd been called up for spars he'd gone with resignation. Even if it was all but certain he would lose, he stood up to the challenge. _"You're right. This is something he needed."_

To be given the chance to prove oneself was something she'd long since yearned for. Who was she to deny his?

' _You're strong too, Ruby. I can tell, all of you are going to be great.'_

" _Heh, thanks."_ She recognized this, along with her eyelids which were like boulders.

' _Even the best need sleep though. You should head back. I'm willing to bet Jaune will still be here in the morning.'_

A yawn came out in place of her protest, and all around this feeling was mirrored in a chain reaction. As if a trumpet call, it signaled the return of the Nurse who shooed everyone out lickety-split, allowing both the visitors and the patients some well-earned rest.

That night Ruby slept soundly. Which Naruto was grateful for because it took a load of his conscience.

He was already having enough trouble trying to believe his own words. One part continuing to doubt the altruistic face he displayed. Wondering if in fact he hadn't been motivated by his own selfish curiosity when he set Jaune to fight alone. The only thing he was sure of was that the blond boy possessed one of his kind.

-Or was possessed by, depending on who. Naruto had his suspicions.

His sigh went unnoticed among the light sounds of sleep from the four slumbering girls.

It was going to be a long night.

* * *

 **So, before anyone decides to get angry at me for making Jaune OOC, keep in mind Team 7's first meeting with the 'Demon of the Mist'. They were scared shitless, and that was with moderate mental preparation. Imagine a civilian like Jaune being plagued by the same sensation day after day for weeks on end. Of course he overcame it. But the Emerald Forest was never going to be enough to change his outlook, and he needed a bigger catalyst. Or just a different one, such as we all do.**

 **Anything else you want to bitch about is fair game, though. Just like I can bitch about not getting enough feedback. I need help people! (in more ways than one).**


	5. Paleozoic: Silurian (Nonconformity)

**UPDATED (AGAIN, AGAIN) 12/5/18**

 **Lyrics: Gogol Bordello 'Forces of Victory'**

* * *

 **PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, READ THIS AN!**

 **First things first:  
**

 **AS OF 09/24/18, CHAPTER 4 HAS BEEN SIGNIFICANTLY EDITED. **

**The section with Ozpin has been completely replaced, so I suggest you go back and reread just that section. Fuyuriku was kind enough to point out some major logical failings which I hope to have rectified with the update. **

**And speaking on THIS update...**

 **I have failed. Once again, this was supposed to be a comedy and I have in turn created a monster. Okay, moving on.**

 **I forgot to mention that the artwork is done by a very talented friend whom I know in real life (Crazy, huh?). You can check her out Facebook under BunLatte: Mineral Girls. Not going to help if you mention me though, because I really doubt she knows this profile.**

 **Moving on.**

 **This update is short, as the second half contains the promised preview of a (potential, very potential) new story which would be a Gundam Wing x RWBY crossover. Before all y'all get your panties in a bunch, I'm mainly using this as a placeholder to beef up this anemic chapter. The reason I am posting at ALL is because I am leaving tomorrow at oh-my-god-it's-early for a week-long post-apocalyptic party in the desert where I will have NO internet access. That said, after I get back and decompress, this chapter will likely be replaced by a proper one and the preview removed and place in the same closet where the rest of my dreams go to die.**

 **So I hope to see you all in a week with a second part to this chapter, unless I get really lucky and the world really does end while I'm out there.**

 **Cool? Cool. Now have fun!**

* * *

 _How did it get to be like this?_

' _What?'_

Unable to recoil away from the question penetrating through his conscious like pickaxe lobotomy, Naruto felt the cracks proliferate and did his best to hold himself together.

" _I was just asking how you got to be like this."_ Her soft voice a salve, healing old wounds enough to allow him to collect his pieces. _"I'm sorry if that's a… personal question."_

' _No…'_ Yes. But it was only fair given how much this innocent opened her life to him without reciprocation. Trite platitudes, all he ever offered in return. _'It's just… kind of sudden.'_

" _Not really…"_ Fog of thought dispersing, Naruto concluded that after two months of coexistence, perhaps it was not. It just begged the question of why now- though that could have been chalked up to the tedium of once again being in Professor Port's class. _"It's just, you always talk about your life back when you were… human, but you never told me how you became like… this."_

Simple curiosity, or a specific fear? Impossible to tell with her emotions which were in a hesitant flux.

' _It's not exactly a "happily-ever-after" type story.'_ He winced at his tone betrayed too much of reality.

" _I'm not a child, you know."_ For everything else that meant, he knew she would not be easily placated. Not this time.

' _I know.'_ The forest and its rejuvenating energy seemed so far away, and he felt every bit the beginnings of his sojourn into the past. _'It's also not a short tale, and right now you need to focus on your classes.'_

It was a lot to ask, but she did not complain. Knowing he would need that time to collect the memories intentionally buried beneath blank pages of history. Not to mention time to gather the strength and fortitude within his confines to sift through that mountainous task.

" _Later?"_

' _Later.'_

A promise which came as surely as death. Ruby held up her end of the bargain as best he could tell and so he was left with little choice but to do the same.

Near-instantaneous for him, that same elapsed time to her young life was an eternity waiting for school to end. Disappearing into rosy fragments the moment the bell rang, in a blink they were outside on the extensive grounds. Nothing around them but cropped grass which stretched out to the foot of the ubiquitous forest. A stage without distractions.

Certain that she was the only audience, even then she had learned to take precautions. Planting herself cross-legged, she spread a heavy history text out at her knees and opened it to a random page. It didn't matter which because her attention was far, far off.

' _Very well,'_ He wished he could have shared in her excitement, if only he didn't fear so much to spoil it. _'This all happened a long, long time ago…'_

The story, despite his protests, unfolded very much like a fairytale. Kingdoms in the sky and on the ground, gods, magic, princesses, demons; love, both unrequited and fraternal. The inevitable downfall and tragedy, with a sprig of hope tossed in as garnish.

And that was before he was even born.

What followed was even more incredible, and at the same time, oddly less satisfying than if it had simply been a fable recounted for entertainment. Where there should have been a reconciliation between siblings, forgiveness between parent and child, to say nothing of an overall triumph of good over evil, it instead ended with only-

' _So, yeah.'_ Less in awe, more in shame. _'That's it. The story of my life.'_

"But-" There were things missing. No doubt there would be for an existence spanning epochs to be compressed into a measly three hours. But still she sought justice; for the account, as well as herself. "What happened then? Did Kaguya win? What about the Tailed Beasts? How did you become like this?"

And what happens now?

' _I don't know,'_ Having asked this question himself for all that time in between, even now sounding less like a truth and more like a hypothesis. _'Frankly I don't know why you even believe me, either. Some days I question myself whether this wasn't a diversion I dreamt up to keep myself sane in this mockery of a life I have been given. It has been so long since I ran into one of the people that I knew from my past, that I am afraid I'll forget what they looked like, the sound of their voice,_ _ **who**_ _they were._

' _How do I know that_ _ **I**_ _am who I think I am? I've retold this story to myself so many times, that surely it must have changed little by little with each iteration. Is it even the same story anymore? I don't know. There's a lot I don't know. Not the least, where I go from here.'_

The last of his words carried away on the fleeting Summer breeze with Fall's spicy scent rushing in to fill the void. Ruby felt a chill run through the worsted jacket and creep through the warp and weft of her linen shirt underneath. Summer might as well have skipped directly to Winter as the voice aged several seasons in the span of a single sentence.

"Then," In the passing months her mouth had gone dry, and she had to remember to swallow and wet her throat. "Why did you help me?"

' _I don't know.'_ With a grim chortle he was able to revel in the irony, at the very least. _'I suppose, at first, I was hoping you would give me purpose. That maybe I could be of use to you.'_

Upon these words her chest tightened in an unknown emotion. It could have been guilt, but she had no idea in all rights what she should have been feeling, especially because she had been doing just that.

' _There's another story- one I haven't told you yet. And a person, one who was very important to me. They were so influential that I doubt it matters if they were real or not, though I'd like to think they were. They told me that one is at their strongest when they work to protect a person who is precious to them. Maybe I thought that I could find that person in you.'_

"Precious…?" Herself turning to stone with cheeks a rosy refringence, inside feeling nothing but cold. "And… what if I'm supposed to find that in you?"

' _What?'_

"You've tried to make me strong… what if I'm the one supposed to protect you?" A hand slipped through the tightly knit wool to shield the invaluable object within, feeling the strong but gentle pulses beating as one. "Maybe I'm being naïve, maybe I'm looking for meaning when there isn't any. But isn't it possible that the story doesn't have a happy ending because it's waiting for me to give it one? If I could get strong enough, I'm sure that I'd be able to find a way to turn you back!"

In her mind it made perfect sense. Stumbling through the Veil that fateful day into the realm of magic and fantasies. It would coalesce her hopes and resolve that jumble of empirical happenings in a single stroke.

' _Ruby…'_ That same move painting a flourish of paths on the once-blank wall in front of him. Prompting him to take the first step out of a 2D world and rejoin reality in all its spectacular glory.

' _No.'_

Soaring as high in her daydream as the Nevermore had carried her, it was a long way to the ground with the wings so ruthlessly clipped.

" _Why…?"_ She asked silently,clutching that thing which was still fluttering, trying to fly its way out of her chest.

' _As wonderful as it would be to believe, I would be doing you a disservice if I allowed you to continue thinking like this.' Spoken_ neither as a gregarious youth or an old man- not even something in between. Forcibly removing himself from it all. _'Reality may not be perfect, but it's important that you be grounded in it. I've taken up too much of your time already recounting my accomplishments when all you need to do is learn from my mistakes.'_

As much as she wanted to do something to refute him, to console him, she knew her words would fall short and hands fail to touch the soul buried so deep within.

' _Please Ruby. I couldn't forgive myself if something were to befall you because of me. I've lived my life, and now you need to. If you can't unconcern yourself, just don't pity me. Let me be your tool. With that wonderful scythe you have no need for shield and sword. So let me be your dagger hidden in your boot, the crystal ball in your corner, or if only a single matchstick in your pocket, I would be happy.'_

Even this was probably too much to ask of her, but he could do little else, he had nothing else.

' _-And then I would always be with you. But you need to rejoin life now. Wake up, Ruby.'_

' _Wake up-.'_

"Ruby?"

Startled out of her skin and then back into it, hands flailing and jaw flapping as they remembered how.

"Whoops, sorry sis. Didn't mean to scare you when you're working so hard." Showing how close she'd gotten unbeknown, Yang leaned over Ruby's shoulders expecting to see the glowing postcard of a Scroll where there was only the unused history text. "-Or is it hardly working? I thought I heard you talking to someone…"

"Nope!" She croaked. "Just me…I'm uh, just reviewing myself." Not that it was a lie.

"Ah. Well I know someone who'll be happy you're studying so hard." Flopping down on the cool grass next to her sibling, understanding then why she'd chose to do so out here instead of their dorm. "Though I hardly think 'happy' could ever really describe that stick-in-the-mud, so don't go putting yourself out trying to satisfy little miss Perfect, K?"

"That's alright. I think I'm just about done here, anyway." Closing the book with a resounding thump.

"I hear ya. You must've been out here for a while. There's only so much you can do before it become counter-productive, right?"

"I suppose." Fingers halfheartedly traced the heavily embossed cover, too fanciful to be a boilerplate textbook but even then, sorely lacking in feeling. "So, did you need something Yang?"

"What?"

There was a moment where the two stared at each other like strangers, and in that lilac reflection Ruby could hardly even recognize herself.

"I-uh-I mean, you came to find me all the way out here, I was just wondering if I'd forgotten a team leader's meeting or something."

Yang's sharp gaze softened, delivering a love-tap to the ravenette's head.

"Ow."

"You dummy." Moving in to swaddle the bump in an undeniable hug. "Do sisters need to have an excuse to spend time together?"

It was a question Yang had begun to ask herself. Where her old friends had proved flighty, she had always thought it possible to count on her baby-blood. Now that fledgling bird was coming unto her own, and Yang had to reconcile the fact that it was she who forced her from the nest.

"No," Ruby admitted reluctantly, accepted the embrace heartily. "Guess not."

"Dummy." Yang reiterated. "Of course I'm right. Now, it's nearly dinnertime and you need to eat something- something _other_ than the cookies I know you stash in your jacket pockets."

"-But how-!"

"Same way I found you out here," Squeezing one last time before she stood up, Yang grinned shark-like down at her. "I followed the trail of crumbs."

Metaphor or not, Ruby was embarrassed but allowed herself to accept a hand up, balancing the heavy tome which threatened to topple the girl in her lightheadedness.

"Come on, if we hurry, our partner's will still be there." Not to mention it was probably best not to leave the other two antitheses alone for any stretch.

"Wait, Yang!"

Protesting as she was forcibly dragged along by her sister's herculean strength, nonetheless a smile was beginning to rise once again just as the sun behind was setting.

Between the two, betwixt the fiery past and a stark but uncertain future, Naruto lost himself. Not in thoughts, for those often failed him. But in rhythm which mimicked the pulse of the universe.

 _~If you'll remember those before_

 _And the ones that yet to come_

 _Above suffer of it all_

 _Triumphs the union of souls_

 _With only one thing on its mind:_

 _I can't go on- I will go on_

 _With only one thing on its mind:_

 _I can't go on- I_ _ **will**_ _go on…~_

* * *

 _I can't go on like this!_

At the very least Jaune was able to keep this thought from his monstrous 'instructor'. But that was the only saving grace as he was unable to keep a handle on to anything else; his sword, his breathing, the rest of his life outside of physical training, all were being fumbled around in his tenuous grip.

' _If you have energy to gripe, you have strength enough to pick up that toothpick and run through your strikes again.'_

Jaune would have blanched if he'd not been so sure he'd pass out. That'd result in a worse punishment than backtalk- if such was even possible. Though if the Demon said it was, he'd believe him. Somehow the prickly object always managed to make good on these promises, just like how he uncannily knew what Jaune was thinking despite his practiced concealment.

' _That's 'cause you're predictable.'_ The interjection causing Jaune to nearly be dragged down by the weight of his shield. _'You need this to become second nature so that you'll no longer have to pause to think. An instant of hesitation is all it would take to turn you into chow.'_

Far longer than an instant was what it took for Jaune to reset himself at the far end of the field, practically dragging himself there all the while cursing the no-named being that had parasitically attached itself to him.

' _My name's not important right now. You can't afford to hate me, even as vile as I am. It would be too much of a distraction such as you are. For now, I am everything. I'm your instructor, the bully behind the corner, your nemesis and your only friend. The knowledge that you will suffer if you fail is the only thing you need to know.'_

But was it enough? Pain was an excellent motivator, only until someone got used to it. The mild nettling could still distract the boy, making him flinch and hop-to. Slowly though, Jaune was becoming immured to the sensation.

The looming threat of death at either his hands or that of Grimm was always there- as it should be. But it was nothing like the real-deal, too abstract for a student mired in the drudgery of academics.

Though no one else would concern themselves with Jaune's motivation, content to otherwise ignore or pardon his missteps. The redhead especially had a softness for the blonde that was both disgusting and oddly nostalgic. A pathology which allowed her to ignore his abject unsuitability.

So what drove the boy?

What prompted _him_ to keep trying to help?

This wasn't the blond he had known lifetimes ago, it was a mockery given traitorously familiar features. Jaune wasn't half the man the kid was at half again his age. He bitched and moaned when pressed, tried to find ways around his problems instead of barreling straight through them. He didn't posses the same fire, lacked the fortitude behind those flaccid blue eyes. Here was not someone fighting a righteous battle for the sake of others.

And yet, he kept getting up.

The one person who should have given him inspiration was spying on them from behind the trees, and Jaune was totally unaware. If not for admiration, if not to protect, if not for honor, if not to destroy, why fight?

That question right there was Zabuza's own motivation. He had survived eons on a previous hope, one which would allow him to finally rest easy. Now he wanted to hang on a little longer and see where Jaune's drive led him.

And he wanted to see what it would take to break.

' _Go on. Prove me wrong, boy.'_ Prompting Jaune as he wearily made his way through the katas without instruction and without admonishment for his sloppiness.

 _Prove to me that my way of thinking is obsolete, that I am in fact superfluous. Isn't that the goal of every new generation? To raze the ideology which came before, just as it is for us old guard to bear witness to the end of an era._

* * *

"You may begin."

For lack of single word, the room was abuzz with the perfunctory sounds of pencil on paper like a flock of woodpeckers as all attacked the slim obstacle between them and the birchwood desks. An occasional cough or scraping of chair legs broke this organic symphony, but nothing enough to distract her from that singular goal.

" _Name and discuss three characteristics shared by all species of Grimm."_

Answers flowed from Weiss's brain to her hand without pause. A succinct but complete analysis of their chitin armor and its predominant weakness in areas of mobility; their pack habits including most notable exceptions; and of course, their universal animosity towards all sentient species.

An approving hum undermined the clacking of writing instruments, prompting a smirk as she moved on to the next question.

" _At what time of day are Grimm most active? Are they diurnal or nocturnal? Why?"_

Trick question, which she knew without the agitated whine of cricket's bowstrings telling her so. Grimm were attuned to the circadian rhythm of their prey. In other words, human and Faunus, making them potentially alert twenty-four-seven.

With a small, self-satisfied smile she relished in the approving buzz and turned her test back to the multiple-choice questions she had skipped to allow time for the short-answer section.

" _Which of the following was_ _ **not**_ _attributed to a Grimm attack?"_

 _A) The Sacking of Samarkand, 739 ADD_

 _B) The Razing of Vale, 332 ADD_

 _C) The 'Great Flood', 110 ADD_

 _D) The Long Months, 1366 ADD_

 _E) None of the above_

Another tricky one… for someone who knew nothing. The answer was both A and D. The first was a pivotal battle during the first war of the Kingdoms, and the second was a freak natural disaster caused by an especially hot year where a lightning strike ignited a field of crops and burned some several thousand acers of farmland, leading to an especially bad famine in Atlas.

" _On his first official mission, what was the number of Grimm defeated by Professor Peter Port, Esq?"_

 _A) 1_

 _B) 4_

 _C) 12_

 _D) 30_

Resisting the urge to simply strike the question off the face of the page (let alone the face of the earth), Weiss tried to wrack her mind for a way to derive the answer. Clearly, no one would remember, not even her in her habitual note-taking. It was an effrontery for that rambling braggard to ask such a question. Acknowledging this, she simply circled the most implausible answer and moved on before the nonsense blunted her senses.

" _Most common Grimm in Vale?"_

 _B) Beowulf._

' _Correct.'_

" _Most common Grimm_ _ **Worldwide**_ _?"_

 _E) Not Recorded_

' _Correct.'_

" _Yearly average ratio for Grimm to Humans and Faunus?"_

 _C) Between 3:1 and 15:1_ _The highest usually in either Menagerie or Vacuo due to their low populations._

' _Correct.'_

" _Among city-dwelling civilian populations, the most lethal Grimm is: _"_

 _B) Beowulf_

' _Incorrect.'_

" _Among huntsmen and huntresses, the most lethal…"_

The next question might have helped her realize the error, but she had simply stopped reading by then. Looking back at her test, she acknowledged that she had circled B even if something in her mind said different. Not a coaxing hint, nor even a nagging feeling, but an abrupt contradiction. She thought she knew the answer, but something _**else**_ thought differently.

' _While it is tempting to assume the most populous Grimm is the principle cause for mortality rates, it is rather the unassuming Rapier Wasp which accounts for most non-combatant fatalities. This is because the majority do not grow much beyond the size of ordinary wasps, and thus go easily unnoticed in daily activities, leading them to be inhaled or eaten accidentally. Anaphylactic shock is also a more common reaction with the Grimm, and if left untreated can be fatal.'_

The explanation made sense. What didn't is why she suddenly knew that. Coming from a cold climate where insectoid Grimm were uncommon, she didn't know as much about them as perhaps she should.

But something did.

A chill overcame her. Unlike the familiar sensation of her home, this one wracked her body and caused her to shake in her seat with the feeling that someone was looking over her shoulder. Not that she could check, as the only thing she could do was try and steady her pen and keep her bracelet from rattling by clamping a hand on her wrist. Her arm was out of her control- everything was suddenly out of her control, and it was all totally illogical.

She fought it though. That ominous sensation which tried to undo her. Fingering the smooth metal brought forth a calming drone, one which counteracted the alarm bells in her head and slowed her racing heart…

*BRRRRIIIIIIINNNNG!*

Most of the test-takers weren't as startled by the bell as they were the sudden scraping clatter, dozens of eyes watching as Weiss shot back in her seat and nearly fell over in her shock.

"Alright… pencils down, class."

The voice of authority redirected most of their attention back to the front of the class. But it failed to pry Ruby's concerned gaze as she sat next to her partner. Weiss's own focus continued to be with trying to steady herself, ignoring everything else. Minutes passed as students shuffled up to the front to hand in their papers, eagerness to be finished only tainted by the continued doubt and second-guessing.

"Weiss?"

In shame she flinched. Not looking at the obviously concerned expression in order to maintain the rest of her dignity.

"Um, are you finished with your paper?"

She looked balefully at her half-completed test before turning away with disgust. Not like it mattered now.

"Yeah."

Lying as much to herself as to Ruby. Feigning strength as well, she stood and glanced over at her partner- unable to look her in the face. Despite her previous worries of how the younger girl would fare on the exam, it appeared Ruby had no trouble filling everything out in her childish scrawl.

"Are you alright?"

Before she could reply or do anything to prevent it, Ruby reached out to lay a hand on her shoulder.

' _Who are you?'_

"W-what kind of stupid question is that?!" Harshly brushing aside the hand and jumping back so that it couldn't be replaced. "I'm perfectly fine! What's wrong with you? Asking me who I am, such a d-dunce."

Marching as fast as her unsteady feet could take her away from the only one who could probably help. She was already out the door by the time Ruby realized what had happened, the handful of other eyes left in the classroom watching her go in various states of incomprehension.

Two of those people, Yang along with her partner sidled over to the commotion.

"Huh. I wonder what's her problem?" From the entrance, her attention drifted over to the two papers still clutched in her sister's hand. "Guess she didn't study enough."

Over her shoulder there was a hum of dismissal.

"Not even the best books can prepare you for what life throws at you."

Breaking her rigid pose, Ruby dropped her outstretched arm and blinked at the statement provided by the most enigmatic member of their team. But she couldn't see Blake past the outline of her sister.

"Tell me about it." Yang commiserated. "Speaking of: did any of you get question #2?"

"Mm. The answer was 'A'."

"One? Seriously?" Planting her hands on her hips, the blonde glared at the handful of papers. "No way! I assumed he would have just bragged the highest number he could think of."

"That's the thing about lying." Blake's voice fading as she walked away from the pair. "You do it so many times, and people won't believe you if you ever do decide to tell the truth."

The two sisters watched their team divide like Pangea, the dark-haired girl drifting off with an uncharacteristic hunch and her hands shoved inside her jacket pockets. Leaving only one with any speech.

' _Huh.'_ Naruto assessed, equally dazed. _'That was weird.'_


	6. Paleozoic: Siluriuan (Post-Depositional)

**UPDATED 12/05/18**

 **Lyrics: Grace Omega by** **Hajime Mizoguchi**

* * *

 **A wall of dust like the uninspiring enclosure on a cheap motel is all that can be seen for miles on end. The wind howls and roars, taking the place of animals which have fled for shelter underground against the flying sand scouring the landscape and excoriating flesh. Everything in every direction is blind, deaf and dumb.**

 **Suddenly a shadow of movement, a lone piece of living driftwood fighting its way against the haboob. It trudges and stumbles, just as blind as anything else behind its coke-bottle glasses and wrapped tight against the elements in armor and cloth alike which are meant for hostile humans and does little to curtail the force of nature.**

 **Slow and inexorably it comes in to view, less man and more the dregs of what humanity left behind. Swathed in macramé patchwork taken from a thousand different sources, he lowers the shemagh to reveal a haggard face- the same as any of the thousands which came before.**

 **A smile cracks the caked filth as he shouts above the windstorm:**

" **I'm back, bitches!"**

… **Sooo yeah, I survived the Mojave. I think. Coughed up about my body-weight in dust (not THAT kind), and I'm sure there's about as much still clogging my brain based on how long it took me to write this chapter. To be fair though, I had about a week's worth of homework to catch up on, so maybe the next ones will come easier?**

 **Ha. What a cruel joke. This thing is going to fight me all the way, I can tell. People could make it easier on me by telling me what they like and what they don't, but where's the fun in that?**

 **Anyway, we still have a long way left, so plenty of time for that to change.**

 **Where must we go, we who wander this Wasteland in search of our better selves?**

 **Onwards, of course.**

 **Oh yeah, and fuck you, Road-Rash!**

* * *

"What was that!"

Less a question and more a hissing wind which flitted through the hallways as Blake exited the classroom. The moment she stepped from the sight of the doorway, losing her lazy demeanor bound to the floor and flying as a tempest through a tide of students who didn't know what ruffled them.

Ducking into one of the many unlit side-paths built into the labyrinthine campus, Blake stopped to catch the breath which had gone ahead of her. She coalesced and re-solidified in the imperturbable shadows where no one could spy.

There, she remembered her irritation, postponed for the unsettling feeling of which preceded it. She reached into the hidden pocket within her skirt and removed the almost imperceptible weight which lay tucked within.

"Well?"

Curt, demanding, fury not cooled by the shade which enveloped her and the softly glowing gem. Her own chatoyant eyes not letting the floating tortoise-shell pattern scatter under her penetrating gaze.

"I asked: what the hell was that?"

The only benefit the darkness afforded was to obscure the oddness of the one-sided confrontation. The sight of the calmest and most collected member of team RWBY- and indeed of all the first-years students bar Lie-Ren- whispering acerbically at an unassuming stone she literally held between thumb and forefinger.

"Don't pretend like you can't understand me. We're way beyond those kinds of games now."

With the only thing making the situation more bizarre to the omniscient observer being the moment when indeed, the crystal answered back.

' _When did you figure it out?'_

"I don't know, why don't you tell me?"

It emitted a sound even quieter than her hushed invectives. Somehow, Blake was able to translate this:

 _Troublesome_

"Now, just what did you do to me back there?"

Impressing a calm into her voice, Blake knew she didn't need to clarify or yell to get this point across. Referencing the manner in which her body had been conducted like a marionette with invisible strings and even more shadowy intentions.

' _I thought you said we were beyond those kinds of games.'_

Amber eyes blinked like stars in the darkness at the abrupt change in demeanor. Before, snippets of his voice had been frugal and even lazy. Now, both qualities had been banished with the flip of a light switch.

"What do you mean?"

' _That's the point. You know what I mean, just as I'm sure you know exactly what I did back there. You've played around with my "gifts" enough to guess what I'm capable of.'_

As if remembering a dream, she recalled touching upon that power nigh-unconsciously. The times that she tested the shady sensation, probed the power which hung in her frontal cortex like a cotton-candy cloud. Little experiments, like pulling a pencil from across the desk with the shadow of her finger. Or being able to disappear in the most public of places, hiding within random and scattered shade.

"Why?"

' _There it is.'_ The sensation of reclining across the wrinkles of her brain made Blake shudder, but not enough to drop the relaxingly glowing cabochon. _'The question you want to know is why I possessed you back there when previously I'd been perfectly content to sit back and let you borrow some of my power.'_

She knew this feeling. It was the same as watching Adam rapidly receding into the distance: everything was going to be different from here on. Only this time, it felt like she was the only one ignorant to how destiny played out.

' _It's the same reason I'm even answering your question in the fist place: not doing so would be too troublesome.'_

Still not wasting a single word in the lackadaisical response, Blake was nonetheless left with the distinct feeling that she was being empirically judged and that she ought to be careful. The takeover might have caught her off-guard the first time, but there was no telling what else this thing could do to her.

She wetted her lips with a sandpaper tongue.

"Why now?"

A reticence that was clearly not due to slothfulness became frightening with each passing second as she waited for an answer.

' _You think that the body you were given was a curse. If you get one thing out of this, I hope it's that you realize there are far worse fates.'_ There was another sigh as both settled in for what felt like a longer discussion than either wanted.

' _Back when I had a body, I didn't want to do much more with it than stare at the clouds and maybe play a game of Shogi. So, one would think that this existence would be perfect and fitting. It's anything but. Back then I could turn off my mind and sleep as much as I wanted. I can't afford that now. I must constantly challenge myself just to stay sane. And sleep only comes when my energy has been completely exhausted.'_

"That's why…" Blake was reminded of her most recent extraordinary feats. An escape from a White-Fang hunting party she should not have been able to pull off. Restraining the immensely powerful Deathstalker during initiation. The almost hypnotic way people seemed to ignore her obvious black bow which hid her Faunus features. "You've been helping me. And letting me use your abilities."

' _It's a mutually beneficial arrangement.'_ Acknowledging that all had been its doing. _'I am grateful to you for removing me from that machine. This life's a drag, but I've learned that I don't like being used without my consent.'_

Evidently supporting a renegade Faunus terrorist was alright, though.

' _-However, it's also not a good idea to meddle too much. You're a good person, and it shouldn't be a big issue to lend a hand to you every now and then. That being said, I really didn't want to get too involved.'_

This cryptic reasoning was propped up by a hidden web of hoists which Blake desperately wanted to unravel but was preempted before she could find the first thread.

' _I did so because even though this life is a drag, even though I'm admittedly a lazy bastard, even though interfering is stupid for all the reasons I did and didn't mention, there are some things that I can't sit by and idly watch.'_

Once again feeling like she was being judged, and rebelling at the sensation.

' _You tried to cheat off your comrade by using my shadows to copy her movements. The only reason you're getting angry right now is because she couldn't give you the answers.'_

That hammer hitting the nail on the head also induced a knee-jerk reaction, prompting her to throw the offending object far into the darkest and most forgotten corner of that abandoned section. But she found she couldn't, the sticky brown color preventing her from releasing the cubic crystal. The clouds within its translucent window were now wrapping around her hand and crawling up her arm.

' _Don't deny it, that would be really annoying. Honestly, it's not even the cheating part I care about.'_

"What do you want from me?!" For the first time in her life, the shadows were anything but a safe haven and more like a quicksand threatening to swallow her up without a trace.

' _I want you to listen to my advice. It can be the last thing that either of us say to one another if you want, and we can pretend like this never happened. But for that to pass, you need to quit the self-delusion. Because you can betray yourself all you want and that's fine. But the moment you decide to do the same to your comrades, I promise you that you will be… all on your own.'_

It released her, and she could breathe again- or had she invented the whole thing? Her own fears paralyzing thoughts and preventing her from existing without the memories which heretofore defined her. Was she still so close to that dark abyss that she had tried to escape?

' _Those are the kinds of questions you ought to be asking yourself. Never stop asking.'_

"W-what should I do now?" Realizing she hadn't had much of a plan all along and needing to be directed once again.

' _I don't care. Do what you want. I've said my piece.'_

As it did, its presence was no longer required and so retreated back into that unassuming package the size of a postage stamp.

"Wait!"

But it was already gone, slumbering or perhaps just honoring its promise and observing quietly as a bystander innocent to all their dramas.

Accepting this, Blake collected herself once again. Smoothing out her skirt and seamlessly slipping the troublesome rock back into place, deciding to step back out into the light and return to her comrades whom she might still one day call friends.

 _Troublesome woman. If I had all the answers, I wouldn't care. I wouldn't even be here…_

"Hey, Blake! There you are!" Trying to hide any hint that she had been flustered, Yang clattered down from her jog as she approached the dark-haired Faunus. "You skipped out on lunch. Come on, we better hurry, we're already late for our next class."

"You waited for me?" Questioning, trying to remember human words, emotions. Were they any different than Faunus?

"Well, duh." Hooking a tanned arm into ghostly pale. "You were acting kind of strange, and so we were worried."

"We?"

"Me and Ruby anyway. She went after Weiss when you both took off. I swear, something seems to be going around making everyone act weird."

"Sorry."

"Eh? Don't worry about it." Emitting a brilliant smile which threatened to give her a sunburn. "What're friends for?"

" _Friends…"_

"-'Sides, if it's contagious, I expect you to take care of me! Now shake a leg, Glynda's gonna rail us as it is!"

… _Or maybe… I still would. Who really knows?_

* * *

"What was that?"

Very much a question, asked in earnest where the only listeners were the insensitive walls and inanimate decorations in the room. Objects once brightly familiar now cast in menacing relief, cruelly mocking her plight.

"Alright, calm down Weiss." For lack of others, she consoled herself. Grabbed her head so that it was firmly emplaced in the here and now and clamped her eyes shut to not be distracted. "You've been working yourself a little too hard as of late and are having a minor crisis because of it. That's nothing to be ashamed over."

This was easy to convince herself of. Over the past weeks, seeing the underdog of their freshman class claw his way up the ranks was inspiration to the rest of them not to slack off. Threatened by this unexpected turnabout, she dedicated extra hours, erstwhile reserved for pampering, to honing her already precise skill. It seemed that the extra practice ended up grinding a bit too hard on that razor's edge.

"How many books did you read over the last week? Wasn't one of them on Grimm behavior? That must be where it came from and you just forgot. It's all in your head."

A mantra which hummed in agreement, soothing her, relaxing her tensed muscles and allowing her head to flop back and stare at the inoffensive mattress above. Her surroundings came back into focus with a heavy sigh, a calm where she could lament her poor performance on the exam.

"I thought you were supposed to be good luck." Fully reclining with arm stretched to the slatted wood canopy, she accused the silver bracelet which dangled on her slender wrist. "No… that's not fair, is it? I promised to wear you only for special occasions. Perhaps I'm relying on you too much."

Unblemished knuckles caressed her cheek, emulating an intimate touch. She let weariness drop her arm so that she could fixate on that brilliant indigo stone. Her other hand fingered the wire-thin band expertly, as if reading a smooth brail on that mobius surface.

"Then again… it was never about luck, was it?" After all, what kind of fortune leaves a daughter with a piece of jewelry to take the place of a mother she never knew?

The white noise of the lamps took on a remorseful palette as she twiddled the precious stone under the light. But nothing about this action brought any comfort.

'… _We are sorry.'_

Spooked by the voice which seemed to emanate from all directions at once, Weiss shot up, almost hitting her head on Ruby's bunk above and throwing herself out of bed across the room.

"What's the matter Weiss?"

Fixated and preoccupied by the self-inspired commotion, Weiss had failed to note when her partner and captain had crept back into their room.

"Ruby!" Breathless with relief. "D-don't scare me like that!"

That look Ruby gave when wounded by words was almost impossible to refuse. Even during their first day's mishap, it had been all Weiss could do to sustain her anger with the girl while she cowered pitiably. Overcoming the watery eyes and pouty lips only by remembering the browbeating her father once gave her.

And just like that fleeting memory, it was gone. Ruby's depressed countenance replaced by the uncurtailable concern for a friend.

"Sorry. I just didn't want to disturb you if you were sleeping. I know you've been studying pretty late recently."

"That's… surprisingly thoughtful of you."

It was. The unusualness of the whole thing threatening to override the normalcy the weapon-loving girl brought forth.

"As you can see, I'm fine." Herself trying to mimic that mundanity, with a forced huff she folded her arms. "-Apart from being startled by some fool."

Dialog read from a script, it didn't matter that it held no sincerity. That was the way emotional conversations were for Weiss since before she could remember. Doublespeak and hidden entendre the closest thing allowed to a heart-to-heart.

Playing along, the girl smiled. Ready to accept the words at face value like the naïve little child she was.

"No, you're not."

Stopping cold, whatever it was that Weiss was pretending to do postponed indefinitely.

"Of c-course I am." Such unnerving certainty in the child's voice must have been her feverish dreams continuing to plague her. "It's true that I was feeling a little off before, but I think I just needed some air."

Her wet-behind-the-ears leader looked ready to accept this obvious deferral too. If Ruby weren't so socially dense, she might have. That was the only logical explanation in Weiss's mind for what went wrong.

' _When all logical explanations are exhausted, the only explanation is the improbable.'_

"What kind of nonsense is that?!"

Her volume surprising not only the younger girl with mouth ajar, ready- but without having said a thing.

"…I was just gonna ask if you're sure." Ruby continued, regarding her partner with a wary eye. "You're looking pale. -Well, more than usual. I think."

The words Ruby had prepared **had** been nonsense, after all. Drivel. But no longer was it reassuring. Weiss could see behind the bad acting clearly as all the lights in the house came on, the curtain drawn, and the costumes removed.

"That's stupid." Worse, she could see her own. Unable to maintain the image of a critic, just another one of the Punchinellos dancing on stage. "I swear, you and your inanity are going to give me gray hairs."

Anxiousness. Oh yes, this was something she was used to.

She gave Ruby the perfect one-liner, a branch for both of them to pull themselves out before the inevitable fall. 'But your hair is already white'- is what she would say, and then Weiss would call her an idiot and storm out in a huff. It was a routine they had practiced for months now, and so she waited on baited breath for her que.

So why was Ruby just standing there with that stupid look on her face? Opening and closing her mouth several times looking for the right lines.

"…It's special, isn't it? Your bracelet, I mean." A hand moved to her sternum where Weiss knew she kept that sweetly-colored crystal on a thin band of chain-link, conflicted expression oh her face.

"…Yes." Weiss answered through clenched teeth "It was my mothers." The words, coming out with a sigh, didn't feel nearly as painful as expected.

"Oh." Ruby brightened and then dimmed just as quickly, settling on a stubborn smile which ebbed and flickered but refused to die. "You must miss her, huh?"

"I never knew her." Weiss blurted out. If it hadn't been out of bitterness, then her next comment surely was, "My _**father**_ made sure of that."

"Oh." Almost regretting saying anything as her coldness extinguished Ruby's smile. "I'm sorry."

"Why?" Crossing her arms, Weiss disguised the wince at the familiar words. "There's nothing to be sorry for, Idiot."

It should have ended on that note, familiar insult with just the barest hint that it was all in jest. But instead of taking her que and storming out, Weiss was stuck in that nettling silence. And she had no one to blame but herself.

"What about you?"

"Huh?"

Weiss found her blush of discomfiture was easier to bear than the silence.

"That necklace you always wear. Was it a gift? A memento?" It had been there, Weiss was sure. Genuine empathy. Were they more alike than she thought?

"Eh, not exactly…" Ruby blushed gaily as one hand gripped the crystal tighter, the other moved to rub the back of her head in chagrin. "You could say it was a gift from a… friend." Chuckling at something left unsaid.

Anger was a reliable tool. It had enabled her to resist Ruby's puppy-dog gaze. It gave her the strength to defeat her father's champion and escape to Vale. And now, it transcended all her previous opposing emotions as she reeled at herself for showing such foolishness. How could she think that this child could understand her even a little when she was fixated on tawdry things like her weapon and fantasy romances?

"Forget it. Forget I asked." No embellishment was needed for her icy tone as Weiss mechanically moved towards the door. "I really don't need to hear about the elementary-school crush who gave you that trinket."

"I wish I did have something to remember my mother."

Weiss stopped perpendicular to Ruby on her way out, whilst the girl continued to stare through the space she had once been.

"When she died, dad gathered up all her stuff out back and burnt it until there was nothing left but dust. I understand now why he did it, I think. Still, I wish he had left something for me and Yang to remember her by." Ruby smiled wryly. "Well, something besides her gravestone."

Looking across, Weiss wondered again how far apart they really were. If she were to reach out right now, would they touch, or would she pass straight through like a mirage?

"I spent a lot of time just talking to it, for hours on end. Every day at first. Then a few times per week, then per month. With being in school, I can hardly go at all now."

Who was this girl with such melancholy? The only thing resembling Ruby was the stubborn fortitude to push through.

"…But maybe that's for the best?" Tears were already starting to form as she prepared to pull off that bandage. Though whose was ambiguous. "Someone told me that we need to live in the here and now. Wake up to the fact that life isn't like a fairytale. Thinking on it, I realize that I haven't been doing that. I need to pay more attention to what's going on around me. That's why I'm sorry."

The same hand pressed to her chest was used to wipe her unshed tears and with a deep sniffle she drew up a smile for her white-haired teammate.

"I'm sorry if I haven't been the best captain, but I'm trying!" She would become the rock, the anchor and the sounding weight both, for her team. "I promise," _I hope_ "-That one day you can be confident to rely on me."

A confidence built on the backs of those who came before, stacked on one another like building blocks.

From there, it was still turtles all the way down.

"Ruby," Weiss sighed, moaned, heaved. "As I said before: you're fine." Their mirrored smiles were self-supporting without anything else to prop them up. However, nostalgia dragged her gaze down. "I came here to overcome my family's history, and it's my own fault for letting it hold me back. Looking at the past, or people like my sister, it's so tempting to believe that everything could be perfect, or at the very least, somehow better. But really, that's just a cruel lie we tell ourselves."

"Mm. It's not like the dead could suddenly wake up and tell us our mistakes, or how we should live our lives." Ruby's own stare brought low by the weight of irony, and in those depths, seeking something to tell her she was wrong.

"…And what if they could?"

"What?"

"What?"

A whisper in Weiss's head that had somehow made it to her lips. Even then, so quiet as to be blamed on the hush of air cycling in and out of the vent. The only way one would have been able to catch the words would have been if they were looking for them.

"-Nothing." Trying to convince herself that she hadn't had the thought, Weiss hurried to distract them both from its inception. "I'm suddenly feeling very tired. Perhaps we could continue this talk after I've had some rest? Tomorrow maybe?"

Hopefully by then they would have both forgotten the whole episode. Hopefully Ruby would take the positive encouragement- if not the hint, and leave her alone to sort her thoughts.

"Oh, okay." Disappointment which Ruby was nonetheless able to overcome while she watched Weiss fiddle and contemplate the metal band between her fingers. "Someday, I hope I can help you you're your happiness."

Stricken of all energy, for real, Weiss froze.

"I'll be satisfied when I can wear my family name without shame." She had overcome so much already, and yet that mountainous goal still loomed high over her. "…I'm beginning to think that it might be a fool's dream."

"No!" Not even realizing she had let this disparaging thought past her lips, Weiss flinched. "You can't think like that! It might not be possible on you own, but I promise you that I will do everything I can to help you accomplish it! Believe it!"

Crickets chirped through the closed window in onomatopoeic commentary.

"…That was really lame."

"Yeah. It really kind of was."

"But," Facing fully her leader- her _partner_ , Weiss placed her adorned hand on the shoulder that was at a level with her own. "I appreciate it. I'm fine, though. I really am. Just really, really tired."

"It's been a long day, huh?" Despite the sun having only just set.

"You said it." Weiss moved back to brush a few strands of hair which had escaped from her ponytail. "It's been a long few weeks. I think we ought to do something to relax this weekend, what do you say?"

Cringing preemptively as Weiss watched Ruby visibly swell. Thankful as a valve released and she simmered down to a safe level.

"That sounds great."

"Mm. A spa might be nice." Weiss mused, already firmly attached to the idea like a life preserver. "I haven't been to one in a long time, and I am sure it would help clear my head from everything that seems to be rattling around in there."

"Heh, yeah, they can get to be a bit much sometimes, can't they? But they do mean well."

"They?"

"You know," Blindly Ruby pointed at the piece of jewelry Weiss had set back in its cradle as it seemed to wink at her, then furtively gestured to the tiny crease in her own dress shirt and whispered conspiratorially. "Them."

The plague of crickets returned, soon joined by a cacophony of alarmed cicadas when that turned out to not be enough to express the growing alarm.

"Air."

"Huh?"

"Air." Weiss repeated absolutely, fixated on her path of escape. "I need air."

If the window had been open, she might have been at risk for taking that route as the quickest way out. As it was, the door chose that time to crack open as the remainder of their team waltzed- and shuffled in.

"Hey! There you guys are. How come you ditched us? Never mind, look who I fou-"

The white arrow bounced between two newcomers, trouncing static physics and knocking them into furniture and the unyielding doorframe before it rocketed down the hallway.

"Weiss!" Ruby shouted with a leap towards the doorway. "Yang! Blake!" Changing her focus when the two meaty obstacles did not move out of her path.

"Ooh… I really _Yanged_ my head… ooh… that was pretty bad."

"The collision, or the pun?" Blake asked, trying to brace herself against the doorframe.

"Both, kinda…" She admitted.

As the only thing he could do, Naruto just sighed to himself, speaking for the first time since the conversation began.

' _I'm_ _ **not**_ _going to say that might have gone better, but-'_ "-Troublesome…" _'-Illogical reaction.'_ "-Owww…."

'… _For what it's worth, it could have been worse.'_

The problem was that Ruby didn't know how.

* * *

Things could always be worse. This was a fact that Ozpin knew all too well.

Still, even he was a tad bit surprised at how quickly the phone-call had degraded.

"I feel your frustration, James, believe me I do. However, we are having enough difficulty simply keeping up with the current Dust robberies, let alone following up on past incursions outside our jurisdiction. We simply do not have that kind of manpower."

" _The train was destined for Vale though."_ Stern-faced and obviously far wearier than Ozpin knew himself to be, General James Ironwood reasoned tirelessly. _"Its loss is one of the chief contributors to your Kingdom's current shortage. Finding where the cargo was smuggled should be your top priority-"_

"And pray tell, what would you have me do? Turn back the clock so I can uncover new evidence on a cold case?" Straight expression belying what would have been sarcasm on anyone else. "Despite what some of my students and even faculty seem to think, I am neither omniscient nor omnipotent. I am a subject of serendipity just like everyone else here, and so must wait until either that time we are blessed with a lucky break or the perpetrators make an error."

" _Why don't you just put Qrow to task? I may not personally like the man, but I cannot deny his effectiveness, especially when it comes to extracting information out of the lower rungs of society."_ Between the lines read: degenerates attract degenerates.

"Qrow is already busy on a long-term assignment which is of the utmost criticality."

" _You're talking long-term, but Vale's energy reserves won't last six months without that Dust supply. I don't know why you aren't taking this more seriously!"_

Closing his eyes and folding his fingers, Ozpin attempted to let the anxieties slough off his steeple. Not that he didn't sympathize, but Ironwood's burdens were his own, and he couldn't afford them on top of everything else.

"I can say with absolute certainty that I am taking this very seriously, General."

Missing, or just ignoring the formal address, Ironwood continued to let his policy speak.

" _What is your plan, then? So far shipping lanes are still open, but it will only be a matter of time before they start to get ambitious again and go after a bigger target. You need to take a more active stance against this insurgency! I know that your people are used to a certain tranquility and peace- and doubtless, increased security measures will put a strain on both your citizens as well as your hunters- But in comparison to the desperation that will run rampant when families can no longer travel, heat their homes, flip on a light switch at night, hell- flush a_ _ **toilet**_ _\- you'd have riots in the streets! What would you do then?"_

"I reckon what we always have done." In all seriousness he leaned back in his chair and contemplated the esoteric mechanics overhead as if they were the algorithms of Vale itself. "We will come together as a people and surmount this obstacle as we have all others. It is truly amazing what you can accomplish when you depend on people, instead of relying on machines with built-in limitations."

" _At least one can count on machines to behave as they are told."_ Recognizing the slight to his dogma, the man grumbled.

"On the contrary, I have long-since counted on people to do the unexpected, and I am seldom disappointed."

"… _Then you are a fool."_

It was with the same sincerity that Ozpin considered Ironwood's judgement and its validity towards his current actions, or inactions as they so happened to be. At times in his life, he would have agreed or disagreed unequivocally. Now?

"Perhaps." Thumbing his cane which lay next to the stack of completed paperwork by his desk, he smiled wryly. "If it so, I will go down as the fool who placed his bets that humanity's will to create could supersede its urge to destroy."

" _If that happens, there will be no one left to remember or even to care."_

"I have no doubt, that the remnants we leave behind will."

Static and clockwork fed off one another for a while in absence of their masters. Until at some point Ozpin's cryptic assurance bled its way through the fiber-optic cable and sobered the General's fuzzy logic. He knew that whenever Ozpin became vague or abstract, it was because he had knowledge that either couldn't, or wouldn't, be shared. And he had no choice but to trust the enigmatic man.

He had done so for a long time, and Ozpin hadn't let him down so far.

Ironwood sighed. _"Sorry, Oz. Polendina's research has been seriously retarded by the shortage, and I've got a bunch of politicians breathing down my neck because of it. Not the least of which is Schnee who is pushing for more relaxed labor laws, again. And because of the declared "emergency", the council is actually looking like they might approve him. That sort of talk isn't conducive to a positive outlook on society. But I'm sure you know your people better than I do."_

Ozpin waved him off, a blue-shift smile appearing on the other side of the connection in Atlas.

"Don't discount yourself James, you are a very capable leader and I am sure you will be able to handle things on your end. I do not begrudge your viewpoint, and your input is always valued."

" _If not always welcome, I know."_

"Well, you might have chosen a more decent hour to call…" Ozpin cocked his head and immediately decided that was a bad idea when the gears above his head weren't the only part of his room that was spinning.

" _Sorry, but the world doesn't stop moving when you want to go to sleep, Professor."_ With his own smile cracking across his staticky image this time, Ironwood amended, _"We're due a face-to-face soon enough, I'll try to have some better news by then. If not, a bottle of wine, perhaps?"_

"I think by then a drink will be in order."

 _One way or another._

" _For now, then, goodbye."_

"Goodbye."

Simple, polite, the final words exchanged by the two politicians would be overlooked as mundane, and perhaps even unnecessary for those whom had known each other for so long.

Not to Ozpin. To him, the ceremony was important. For he had lost far too many friends and comrades without being given the chance to say so little. And no post-humous eulogy or eternal epitaph would ever mean as much.

And yet…

' _I dislike that man.'_

There were the voices which superseded death, immortal words which were weight in the pocket as well as the shoulders.

' _He reminds me too much of that old war-hawk, Danzo- may they have buried him deep!'_

"James means well, and he has only the best interests for his people at heart." Ozpin defended weakly, either because he was too tired or because in many ways he agreed with the blunt assessment.

' _As did Danzo. And by now you should know where his Machiavellian policy got us.'_

So he did. In fact, both names were eponyms in their current vocabulary, alike in their negative connotations and obscure origins. Ozpin was one of the few who knew the history, but never pretended to know all the secrets behind it.

"Are you not going to defend your former comrade, Koharu-dono?"

' _There is little point in arguing about the past when the present is so radically different.'_ Sounding very much like the elder she was supposed to be instead of the perpetual teenager Jiraiya of the Sanin portrayed. _'He raises a significant point. I am concerned if you are doing enough to prepare for this inevitable crisis.'_

' _You do realize all that is bullshit, right?'_ Jiraiya piped up before Ozpin could reply. _'He's no more concerned over the trainloads of Dust than Schnee is over a Lien in the street. We know what he's really worried about, just as we know where it is now.'_

"Thank you, Jiraiya, for your input." Ozpin interjected with his eyes closed to ignore the vexed flicker. "I am fully aware that James made a miscalculation in transporting the testbed during such an uncontrolled exercize. But you cannot fault him for being concerned about its recovery."

' _Nor can you fault him for his recklessness, Jiraiya_ _ **-kun**_ _.'_ The childish grumble which resounded in his mind like a forgotten memory brought a smile to Ozpin's otherwise serene face. _'In all fairness though, for once I must agree with my rebellious Kohai. It is clear that the general is most concerned about the Sentient that he lost. And in his distraught state, he inadvertently informed us as to its criticality in Dr. Polendina's project. The question is now: should we return it?'_

Ozpin hummed in contemplation. Jiraiya's information network had revealed a great deal about the ambitious undertaking, and it both excited and concerned all of them greatly. What the doctor was attempting to do was create life essentially from scratch, terrifying and wonderful to contemplate all in the same breath. Robotic life could be the compromise between the two headmaster's viewpoints, which would be their salvation.

…And which could just as easily spell the end of humanity.

Again.

' _If the doctor is relying on one of our kind to fuel his research, would it really be considered a breakthrough?'_ Jiraiya's sober reasoning wrangled his considerations back on track. _'True, it could simply be a crutch until he gets the formula right. I still do not appreciate the notion that he is playing around with living beings, whether he realizes it or not.'_

' _If one could consider this form of existence "life".'_

' _What? You getting bored of being the Old-Man's sounding-board, hag? You want to volunteer to be a guinea pig?'_

' _And if I do?'_

There would be no more impact if the physical gears themselves ground to a halt as the ones in all their minds did the same, each reeling and trying to connect with this suggestion.

'… _no, of course not. This life may not mean much in comparison, but I would still not enjoy being a plaything in Atlas' machinations.'_

The world started up again as if no time had been lost, the hitch in the mechanism an imagination.

' _I wouldn't mind.'_

…Maybe they ought to switch to digital?

"Are you certain?" Without trying to hide his distress, Ozpin turned his attention to the purple speck flashing between gear-teeth. "If that is what you want, I of course would abide by your desire…"

' _Are_ _ **you**_ _certain we should be giving that man such a powerful asset?'_ Koharu spoke against any notions before they were entertained.

' _It is a weapon they are after. No matter what guise they try to give it.'_ Jiraiya reinforced. _'As much as I hate degrading us to mere resources, in this case we cannot ignore the potential danger involved by giving that man any more power. Even if it is for a supposedly 'noble' cause, or in obliging any one of our individual whims.'_

' _Not so noble nor so much a whim, dear Jiraiya.'_ Serene and amused, the feminine voice tittered. _'The General may be looking for a tool, but the Doctor is looking for a daughter. One such as he lost before, I doubt that he would let even the military exert control over his precious creation… again.'_

' _In other words, you think you can safely operate as an agent within the project.'_ Extrapolating the logic, as if he hadn't already contemplated this very scenario. _'You want to fuel Polendina's research in the hope that your conscience will survive whatever procedure he has in store. I hardly think that bet is worth the risk of losing one of us. And with Tsunade gone, I'm not about to start gambling. Besides, where is the benefit of undermining an ally?'_

' _Ah, much too cruel! You wound me! My only concern is for that poor girl who lies somewhere between life and death. If I could but help in any way, is that not reason enough?'_

' _This isn't a fairytale-'_

' _No, indeed, this is life.'_ Dropping the whimsical countenance like a tree sloughing off a layer of snow. _'And life has been unrepentantly cruel for far too long. People are looking for a sign of hope that the Kingdom's governments will not be able to provide them. They are looking for a homemade miracle, an impossibility crafted by human hands to restore their faith that everything will be alright. For the price of one of us…_

'… _should we not give them their blue rose?'_

* * *

If only everyone in this world could see it as he did.

Past the current era of calamity to know of the hell-fire in which it was forged, the turmoil which inspired its topography and upheaval which molded its denizens. Perhaps then it would not appear so hostile and broken like the night sky constantly hanging above their heads. And the moon itself which reflected the images in its pale shards, that too could be a thing of beauty.

Like a flower wrought from blood and barbs sprouting from the broken soil.

If only everyone could see that rose, the way he did.

But the people were too enthralled with their silicon idols and gardens of mathematical perfection. Living on the edge of an arête for so long, they had lost appreciation for spontaneity. He couldn't say that they had lost their way, because this was a path that had never been trod. Not even the Great Sage could have plotted the course the world had taken even though he was half a son of the stars.

Perhaps it just went to show that guiding light only came from within.

 _Here! Look here! Not to the polluted heavens or your sterilized conservatories, for nature has sown the best of wildflowers amongst you!_

If only he could tell them that. If only he could tell her that. But words had always been his enemy. Abstract expressions like those shadows of thought fleeing at the first sign of illumination. He was a man of action bound to a glass prison, forced to look out as the world tried to drown its bounty in tears.

" _Did I mess up again?"_

Moonlight streamed perfectly through the tall window upon the upper bunk, as if the room had been designed for it- as if this whole situation had been manufactured for the moment, while she herself was perfectly random.

' _That remains to be seen.'_ It was the same thing he'd been asking, and the same thing he'd been telling himself. _'-But no. I don't think you did.'_

" _How can you be sure?"_

Foiled again by his fecklessness, his inability to say what he ought to. How could he distill eons of lucid thought into a few words of reassurance without them losing all meaning? How could he be so afraid to try?

' _Because…'_ Rationale to elevate, to lift thoughts above the choking haze to see things from the dizzying clarity of the stratosphere. _'That's the only way people like you and I know how to be.'_

And if he was wrong about this like he was so much else, everything would fall apart. Banking all his hopes, weighing his past failures against her own. Was he not making the same mistakes as all the rest of humanity? Rehashing the same faulty logic which damned them in the first place?

-But no. They couldn't be wrong. They simply. Couldn't.

Time, however, would be the only way to tell.

 _Time, destroyer of worlds._

' _You need to rest now, Ruby.'_ Dimming his own vibrance like shuttering the moon, drawing the heavy blinds on her bloodshot eyes. _'Weiss will be back in the morning, and everything will be resolved then.'_

Blake had said the same thing in fewer words. As did Yang, so it was difficult to deny that brand of truth.

" _I can't,"_ She bemoaned. _"It's just too difficult to stop thinking about it."_

' _Mm.'_ That he understood. For thousands of years afterwards, he had found it nigh impossible to stop second-guessing his actions at the End. Infinite scenarios plaguing him with their simplicity and happy ultimatums.

This was something he could help with.

Creeping in like the turning of the seasons, a tune, hardly recognizable as such at first, wafted through her mind.

" _What's that?"_

' _Just something to help you sleep.'_ Pausing broke the spell, her heavy eyelids fluttered open briefly. _'At the very least, just try and relax, okay?'_

Doing so- trying anyway, she turned onto her side and drew the heavy comforter up over her head so that the only light left was the spellbinding glow Naruto gave off like a nightlight for her dreams.

" _Does it have any words?"_

He had been humming. Even though he could emulate the sounds, never would his voice match the enchantment the first time he himself had heard it. But neither could he do the song an injustice, it was too pure for that.

' _In a way.'_

He began again, this time making it a few stanzas farther as she found it harder to resist. The obscure lyrics enticing on a visceral level.

" _What do they mean?"_

She could feel him smile.

' _Nothing at all._

' _~Se he melpt he le heus_

 _Tre he melpt o pridi_

 _Lingu ni he fe he me_

 _Tre he melpt godi_

 _Ste he melpt he le heus_

 _Tre he melpt o pridi_

 _Lingu ni he fe he me_

 _Tre heus o prishid godi~'_

Just as he felt the stream of her conscience begin to run smooth, a pebble was thrown into the halcyon stillness. The door cracked open and another presence tiptoed the room. Countering the noise with opposing vibration, he kept singing softly as Weiss crept over and slipped quietly into her bed. Mindful that Blake was awake as well, he projected his efforts further than he had previously dared ever before. What he hoped was a soothing rumble ran through the bones of the room.

' _~Eta li hapru_

 _Esta mi langu_

 _Oh fabi atshiius_

 _Gofria kruhemen entu_

 _Se he melpt he le heus_

 _Tre he melpt o pridi_

 _Lingu ni he fe he me_

 _Tre he melpt godi~'_

A lone tear which had been held in all that time was released, running down her cheek and pooling into the corner edge of her faint smile.


	7. Paleozoic: Devonian

**UPDATED 12/05/18**

* * *

 **Yo. I'd say I'm sorry for taking this long, but it's been a slog and I'm just happy to be done with it. Honestly, I seem to be having a harder and harder time writing lately despite all the usual things which normally perk me up.**

 **Still- even still, we do our best to push through.**

* * *

' _You want another story? Alright, here's one I haven't told you yet:_

' _It starts off not so long ago, and not so far away, and it's about a girl, not much younger than you._

' _She's running, as you do, but away, far away. And not because she's strong, but because she's weak. She too has just lost her mother- but also her father, her brothers and sisters, her cousins, her friends, her home, everything._

' _And she has no Gods to blame for this tragedy. This is in the days before Grimm wandered the globe, and the only monsters which walk the earth are men- and women._

' _Awakened from slumber only to slip into a nightmare- stumbling by the light of the fire which has already consumed her home, drowned the stars. Fearful of the light which illuminates this calamity, she seeks the darkness once more._

' _She finds it, for it is never that far away._

' _Through the woods she goes. A path she traveled many a time in peace and which had supported her infant gambols now gives way underfoot, swallowing her up without a trace. Down, down, down, the earth embraces her, welcomes her home. It rends her perfectly white dress and ravages her perfectly delicate skin. Hiding her idyllic fear from the world._

' _At the bottom she finds that the darkness is not all she suspected. It is cold, numbing her scratches. And it is tight, holding her broken pieces together. If not for the fact that she couldn't breathe, it would be pleasant. If not for the dreaded loneliness, it would be haven._

' _Instead, she found herself on the opposite side of the street, next-door to the underworld, where only restless spirits denied their damnation dwell._

' _Surprise, surprise; she finds one. Finds salvation at the bottom of that deep, dark well._

'" _Ho? And what is this? What is such a fragile thing doing here?"_

' _From its sealed vug it regarded the creature with familiarity and disdain. Watching as it squirmed ineffectually against the tons of earth piled on top that would inevitably return the being to its fold._

'" _Help!" She begged with lungs and eyes filled with dirt. "I don't want to die!"_

' _Nor does any living creature, it thinks callously, deriding her weakness._

' _Yet, it helps her. Out of pity, curiosity, kindness- assuming it ever had such things in the first place. Using its dominion over the earth, it creates a cavern for her just barely big enough to breathe, and not enough to stand so that she had to crawl like an animal._

'" _The rest is up to you." It says, feigning a disinterested slumber. In all truth, this is the first thing of significance it can remember and clings to her presence like scalding tar._

' _And it will watch for some time while the girl continues to do nothing but lay there as if she were already dead._

' _Was it too late? Did this wretched thing join their eternity too early? But no- she was still breathing, imitating life in this way if no other._

'" _Why do you just lay there?" Its patience breaking before hers, the restive spirit having waited centuries already. "I thought you did not wish to die. Even as the lowliest forms of life, earthworms wriggle and scrounge so that they might blindly find their way."_

' _And what was the direction she should be going? In that impenetrable darkness there was a sense of vertigo in which every direction was just further down into despair._

'" _You belong on the surface. I have softened the dirt above so that you might claw your way back up."_

' _But she claimed that there was nothing for her there, everything she once knew was gone. As long as she remained down there, she would be safe. As long as she lay still, she would never have to know how many bones were broken. As long as she did not open her eyes, the darkness was her doing and she would be ignorant of the horrors which daylight would bring._

'" _As your bones break they will heal and become strong." It mimed reason. "But not if you stay here. Your body needs things, food, water, sunlight. You will not survive, and you will never live."_

' _She maintained that she could squeeze moister from the cracks and eat any bugs that crawled into her mouth. And that the only light she needed was the pinprick of crimson glow it cast on her._

' _It called her a fool, out of nostalgia. However, it truly did not know if she was pathetic or courageous. It did not know if it respected or resented this living thing which forsook her gift. It did not know how much time passed while it watched and pondered, hours, days, weeks, months- only that its own loneliness was not assuaged by her presence. That a bleeding heart didn't mean she was alive._

' _Yet, it takes care of her, assuming the mantle of living that she had given up. Squeezing rocks like sponges for their water, luring creepy-crawlies into her parted mouth and observing her inaction all the while. Trying to make her withered body grow by the light of a dying star._

'" _And," It wonders aloud one day, when her breathing had become more infrequent than the settling of the stones and her once-pale flesh had turned rotten, becoming all but one with the muck which encases it. "What is left?"_

' _A soul without a body, and a body without a will or ambition to call their own. Which was more human? What was distilled when all was stripped away save that singular directive to live another day, another minute, another breath?_

' _Hate._

' _The answer came not as a word, but an idea, broadcast from the husk indiscriminately._

' _And it understood. The hatred for those who put her here- not just in the ground, but on this planet. Hatred for itself as well, for prolonging a life that should have ended a long time ago._

' _And it remembered, its own hatred from long ago when it too had such things to call its own alongside legs, arms, a face, a voice. Where other emotions had withered in the darkness and neglect, hate came easily, roaring back to life from a single spark._

' _And thus, the first Grimm was born.'_

At the end of his story there was no applause. No gasp of surprise even, as if the ultimatum had been predetermined. Yet even as the one telling it, its conclusion came as an unexpected disappointment to him. It was so painful that he had long ago forced himself to forget everything but the tempo from which he had reconstructed it, step by step.

Ah, maybe that was it.

Manually severing himself from the narrative, he remembered the present which was just as quiet as the lonely cave.

-And to two eyeballs like dinner-plates, all silver and glistening after a regretful binge.

"WHAT THE HECK WAS THAT?!"

Ruby wailed, thumping his chest ineffectually with her tiny fists. Useless not only because of her distraught state or significantly smaller stature, but because this was just an illusion he conjured up to help her train. Insubstantial and inhuman, but enough of both for her to wound.

' _You wanted me to tell a story while you were taking a break.'_ Naruto defended, raising his webbed hands in an equally feeble defense.

"That's not how a story's supposed to go!" Leaping back into a conveniently waiting spotlight, she then began to mime a very animated harangue which completely contradicted her earlier fatigue. 'A story's supposed to have distinct and definable arcs which help convey the narrative! The characters are supposed to have realistic and relatable emotional responses! There's supposed to be development! Obstacles to surmount! Rising action! Resolution! Redemption! Morals!"

A finger that was as large as her head jabbed at him accusingly.

"-To say nothing of a happy ending!"

She glared at him, leveling that wagging finger like the barrel of her weapon. So reproachful, so meticulously serious that at first, he did not know how to respond.

-Then he laughed, a throaty chortle like a ribbit which shook his stout projection.

He indulged himself in this liberating expression, as well as the sight of her adorable pout for perhaps a bit too long, because eventually he realized that his laughter wasn't the only sound in that isolated training space.

When he stopped, he noticed that Ruby was facing away from him with her head bowed and back hunched as low as his own.

She was crying.

' _I'm sorry, Ruby.'_ He grimaced at the twisting knot in his gut which wouldn't have felt worse if this had been his actual body instead of just a projection. _'I did not mean to hurt your feelings. It's just…'_ Did she even know how endearing her mannerisms were?

"That's not it." Lowering the hand used to hide the evidence, she turned around to face him with a shaking head. "It's just very sad."

' _Is it?'_ He asked in all genuineness. _'You don't even know how it ends.'_

"I wasn't talking about the story."

Her silver eyes were as scalpels while he lay on a dissecting table, polished to the point they became also mirrors reflecting the indominable will he once represented. Both images brought only discontent.

'… _as I said, you don't even know how it ends.'_

Feigning another smile, as he had done countless times before.

' _Now, I think you've had more than enough of a break. Let's get back to it. You're still too unbalanced when not using your scythe, you have to treat your whole body like it's a weapon, an-'_

Casting such an illusion was as difficult now as it had been when he'd been made of flesh and blood. Requiring such concentration that he was often unaware of his own words (more so than before), let alone his surroundings. Luckily, Ruby noticed at the same time he did.

' _We have company.'_

The large orange toad which had been standing opposite Ruby faded out of existence, leaving only a similarly colored stone at Blake's feet as she strolled up, trying not to seem cautious. This nonchalance was broken as she reached down for Naruto and hesitated, as if he might irradiate her with but a touch. Imperceptibly snagging the chain instead, she tossed him back to his 'owner'.

"Training with 'Naruto'?" Asking as if it were still a question, as if the name were not really a name.

Ruby nodded and with the same motion slipped the silver chain around her neck.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt."

' ' _Salright.'_ Naruto slurred, preempting Ruby's response and at least pretending like he didn't hear anything amiss. _'We've done enough for today. Besides, maintaining that form isn't the easiest thing, and my stamina is not what it used to be.'_

Ruby translated for her teammate, omitting the last bit for whatever reason she told herself.

"So, what's up?"

"Weiss wants to head into the city today. Supposedly, students from other schools will be starting to show up for the Vytal festival and she thinks it's our 'duty' to welcome them." Blake rolled her eyes. "Personally, I think she just wants to scout out the competition."

"Ooh, right!" Ignoring what sounded like annoyed grumbling, Ruby emphasized her own enthusiasm with a fist in her palm. "Well, why not? It'll be great for team-bonding to spend our day off together!"

"As if we didn't have enough to bond over already." Spoken with sarcasm but also a smirk at her leader's upbeat attitude, she fell into step with the girl on the way out of the woods.

"I suppose…" Keeping a secret did indeed give them something which to commiserate- with the emphasis on 'misery'. Spreading the burden between the three of them should have made things easier, but instead, tightened the noose around all their necks. "But can it really be considered bonding if we hardly talk about it?"

"There's not much to talk about." Telling herself this with a shrug.

"I don't like keeping things from Yang." Not so easy to shrug off- for either of them, that which was making their conspiracy a continuous balancing act.

"It's for the best." Blake maintained, albeit with a grimace. The decision was not much of a choice in her mind. Not considering the devastating powers they presided over, held at bay with flimsy chains. "You know what she's like."

"I do." An uncurtailable gossip was just one of her sister's gregarious personas. And it was for this reason Ruby went along with the majority, keeping her lips sealed from her closest family. "I know her better than anyone, and I still say she can be trusted."

"Does she think the same of you?"

Coming to a halt at the forests' edge, where the shadows of Beacon's majestic spires met the shade of the trees. The sun hadn't fully crowned the school's iconic tower and it was still cold. Though it wasn't for this that Ruby shook under her cloak.

"…I'm sorry." It wasn't for the hood's shade that Blake was unable to meet her eyes. "That was uncalled for."

"No," All at once the sun peeked around and blinded them. "I'm trying to lead the best I can, but the right thing to do's not always easy to see." Blindly she reached out and pulled her teammate along, back onto the path. "-So I'll need help to keep things in perspective."

Still holding her hand, Ruby smiled up at Blake in an attempt to reassure her. Trying- and failing to hide the strain that the ordeal was putting on all of them.

"Still…" Looking like she was going to say something else, instead, Blake simply looked away and took her hand with it. She walked a few paces away, rethinking. "I guess… I do have to wonder. Why now? Why us?"

As it turned out, Ruby had been right. There were indeed things that simply couldn't stay buried.

' _Hmph. I told you,_ _ **I**_ _never wanted to get involved. All this is too much of a drag.'_

Ruby hummed in agreement, of the question, of the statement, or maybe just in pontification.

"So I've heard. And-?" Blake's abrupt question stirring the girl, showing it to be the latter. "Does **he** have anything to say about it?"

Naruto had said a great many things, all of them dancing around a form of truth but none of them revealing more of the sorrow she had once glimpsed. His mask was nearly impeccable, and something someone like Blake would be suspicious of. So, Ruby shook her head.

"I don't like this." While perhaps agreeing on some visceral level, Ruby was taken aback by Blake's vehemence. "There's too many coincidences. Too many questions."

There were indeed plenty of each, though they could be developed no more than that. Superficially, it still seemed to be nothing more than happenstance which brought them all together- bar Weiss who was destined to inherit her partner. And it was hard to refute this byline.

"I don't have much of a choice but to believe that Dust are the remnants of ancient peoples." Grimacing at the ground, but mentally Blake's thoughts were clearly on the gem which now replaced a button on her collar. "But the rest… am I really supposed to believe they are helping us out of empathy? Willingly lending us a power that no one's ever told us about or even heard of?"

' _Yet you'd believe that a bunch of rocks are just randomly imbued with magic powers?'_ Unperturbed by Blake's discourteously addressed remarks, Shikamaru defended lazily. _'I've explained chakra to you and its relationship to our current status as best as I can fathom, but we're not exactly in a position to run empirical tests to see if this is true._

' _As for why, again, it's individual. I've explained myself once and that's not going to change. As for the others… good luck getting a straight answer out of either of them. What's left of Shino probably won't understand your question, and Naruto… he's an idiot.'_

Confronted with the logical and irrefutable, Blake was frustrated, turning to her fellow living being for answers. "Did you catch that?"

Ruby's nod only made Blake's frown deepen. "Furthermore, how come Ruby can hear you but the rest of us can't understand other Dust?"

' _You could be a little bit politer when asking, you know.'_ Blake had the decency to at least appear embarrassed by her impropriety. _'Troublesome woman. The working theory I have has to do with treating Chakra like waves as opposed to particles, breaking it apart into ordinary and extraordinary waves we'll call δ_ _ω_ _and δ_ _ε,_ , _respectively. Translating thoughts into pure chakra for simplicity's sake, they both propagate outwards and vibrate infinitely orthogonal to the direction of travel. It then interacts with any proximate organisms capable of observation whose conscience acts as a polarizer -'_

"Alright, alright, I think I get the picture."

' _Clearly you don't.'_ Shikamaru snarked in all honesty. _'You shouldn't ask questions you don't want the answers to.'_ Speaking more generally than either of them could comprehend.

Blake neither acknowledged this advice nor bothered asking if Ruby understood it any more than she did, the bemused expression all too telling.

That was another thing she held in contention with their 'partners'. Blake did not appreciate how she could not read any facial expressions or glean any body language from them. It set off all kinds of alarm bells in her more animalistic mind that she simply could not dismiss so easily.

' _In other words, you really want to know about our motives, which are not always logical.'_

Those still-secret ears twitched at the non-sound, just as Ruby perked up next to her. Blake had learned how seldom her shadowy partner offered unsolicited information, and just how important that made it.

' _The question is: Why does someone do anything? As much as we pretend to reflect our new condition, we cannot completely erase the personalities we wore in life. To do so would be tantamount to death. And for whatever reason, to us survivors that's not an option. The reasons we had back when we were made of flesh and blood might have changed, but not who we are fundamentally. We are no less people than you.'_

The mounting guilt in Blake was like a rapidly encroaching flood, and not Shikamaru's intent.

' _-One more thing: Distancing ourselves also isn't simply for your benefit, it's also for ours. As essential as emotions are, they are also dangerous. To feel is risky. Because every time we do, we are reminded of what we lost._

' _I tell you this not for pity, but simply because it is apparent you need something more substantial- and because you women tend to respond better to a pathos argument. Now, if you could wrap up your little existential crisis and get a move on, you're really killing the mood, not to mention making it hard to nap.'_

"Yeah, alright." Sounding more preoccupied than satisfied (or even annoyed), Blake turned to her captain. "Shall we?"

"Mm." Rousing Ruby once more, the girl answered with a quick nod. "Yang should probably be up by now, anyway."

"Are you kidding?" With a short laugh and a skip, they were back on track. "It's the weekend. That girl sleeps like a rock."

"Oh no!" Suddenly and fully attentive of her teammate, Ruby whipped to face Blake and startled the two of them.

"What?! What is it?"

"You told a pun! She's infected you!"

"That wasn't a pun. It's ironic phrasing." Blake asserted, ignoring the horror-stricken girl and the snickers in the background. "It's _not_ a pun…"

Seeing she wasn't going to win a battle of reason, Blake stalked on ahead of the girl reveling in her minor revenge.

"Troublesome…"

A mutter from the Black-haired woman which was the last straw, the dam holding back the tide of giggles breaking.

As her laughter petered out, Ruby realized a warm feeling that wasn't solely due to the sun which was now fully invested in brightening the day.

That, and a series of pained grunts which took up the silence, accompanied by a gravely scraping.

A strange sound and even stranger sight, as if the forest itself were tired of their company, picking up and moving away.

-But no, it was just Jaune. Just Jaune, nearly crushed by the weight of a tree strapped to his back as he trudged onwards.

"Huh." Was the only thing she could say, the only thing heard above the cacophony of groans, anyway. "I wonder what motivates him?"

* * *

It was without a doubt a beautiful day.

This was the only certainty though, as every step forward was one into an upside-down and backwards world where the open air was asphyxiating and the concrete sidewalk shaky beneath her feet. Every progressive thought was a reinforced truism that despite methodical logic continued to feel so very, very _wrong_.

Every person was an unknown, a potential threat. Even the ones which supposedly walked this path with her might be living a treachery for all she knew- for what she knew about these people labeled 'teammates' was even less than what she apparently knew about herself. The family history she'd once reveled and reviled tossed in the bonfire.

Now having to reaffirm what she could and couldn't do, from the ground up.

"Isn't this great? It feels so good to get off campus, I haven't had a chance to tour the city since I arrived."

Forced cheer, demonstrating that she could still repress these unsettling feelings.

"It's just downtown…"

Weiss also repressed a scowl, not so much put off by Blake's dismissiveness as much as the fact that she couldn't tell what was really behind that aloof attitude.

"Where're we going again?"

Then there was Yang, and Weiss couldn't tell if she should be relieved there was one such fixed variable on their team, or worried that she simply hadn't uncovered anything yet.

"We're headed for the docks." Ruby informed her sister patiently. "Weiss wants to scout out the competition for the Vytal tournament."

"That's not-!" Whirling around with betrayal in mind, Weiss was confronted with the guileless expression from her captain which was like a slap in the face. She shrunk against it, forced to remember that this naïve girl was not her enemy, merely another blind victim. "… alright, fine. So I want to get a leg up on the competition, there's nothing wrong with wanting to be prepared."

No matter how prepared though, it seemed impossible to be ready for what life threw at you.

"Oh. That's cool." Yang quipped, blissfully unaware to any changes in the dynamic between her sister and her partner. "So, what're we doing stopped here?"

Going unnoticed until Yang cocked her thumb towards it, the glaringly obvious yellow tape demarked the scene which took up nearly the whole sidewalk and did little to hide the conspicuously dressed police officers behind it. A wonder as to how it had been missed.

"Hey, I remember this place…" While Ruby didn't have an answer for Yang's question, she did have one to add. "What… happened?"

It should have been obvious without asking, what with the production going on outside and the chaos within, the storefront had fallen victim to the epidemic of robberies plaguing Vale lately. One would have to have been living under a rock to be ignorant of this pervading news.

For even the rocks themselves knew more than they let on.

' _It seems that with you tied up in school, Torchwick decided to try his luck again.'_ Gazing forlornly at the shop which had been his home for close on a quarter century, Naruto's concern was elsewhere. _'I hope Jiji's alright.'_

"Excuse me," Without any crowds to fight against, Ruby pressed on up to the cordon and leaned over the flimsy barrier towards the detectives milling about. "Do you know what happened here?"

"What's it look like, kid?" Sneered one of the shabbily dressed investigators who had until that point been doing nothing but crossing his arms and smoking a cigarette. "Store got turned over last night, stripped of every speck o' Dust."

"Jeezus Sanford, this is a crime scene, try to have some discipline!" Scathing glare directed towards both Ruby and his partner, the other shirtsleeve cop strutted over. "You're not supposed to be givin' out anything to the public- and you, don't cross the barrier!"

"Sorry," Made aware, Ruby let go of the vinyl tape. "I just want to know if the owner's alright. He's… a friend."

With procedures on his mind behind the dark sunglasses, the other cop narrowed his gaze at her.

"What'd I just say kid? I can't go about yammering about the investigation, I'll lose my job- not to mention any leads on the crooks."

' _Not that they'll find any.'_ Breaking his silence, Naruto stated resignedly. Just as resignedly Ruby nodded and made to turn back. _'We already know who did it. The issue is finding Roman. With all the Dust around Vale, it's been hard to pinpoint him.'_

Which meant that the more was stolen and consolidated in one place, the easier it would become to track the thief. Then it became a matter of intercepting him before it was too late.

If it wasn't already.

"Hey, kid." Not rebuking the address, Ruby turned back hopefully. "Don't go quoting me 'cause I'll deny it, but as far as I know there weren't any paramedics on scene. If it's any consolation."

Ruby nodded once again, more assuredly and in thanks before rejoining her friends.

"That was the shop that you helped out before school, wasn't it? The one where you got that necklace." Uncharacteristic cognizance as the blonde posed the question through her sister, a faraway look on her usually animated face.

"Yeah."

"And?" Whatever further information or intrigue Weiss was hoping to get out of Ruby, all she received was a shrug. "Whatever. It's not our concern."

That tight-lipped gaze Weiss issued dared her to say otherwise. In fact, Ruby had to ask this herself. Was it their concern? If not, at what point did it become so? Surely sometime before the flames of war were at their doorsteps and the bottom fell out from beneath them.

Was this a test? And from-for whom? Moving her pensive frown over towards Blake, Ruby looked for some kind of shared perception but found the woman just as troubled as she.

"Let's go."

* * *

At what point did so many coincidences become conspiracy?

Life itself was happenstance, a product of luck. Some would argue the divine variety, making it the machinations of gods as opposed to a random dice-roll.

What would those people say about this?

"Greetings and Salutations! My name is Penny, it is a pleasure to meet you!"

It must be remembered that life, like a lie, stared out simply and then rapidly evolved far out of control of both gods and men.

' _Ruby, there's something different about this girl.'_

"Oh, um, hi, I'm Ruby Rose, and this is…"

"I'm her older sister, Yang Xiao-Long at your service."

"Weiss Schnee.

"Blake."

' _-She's like us, Ruby.'_

"Sorry about running into you," Flawless green eyes like cut emeralds bore into unexpectantly, like they had all the time in the world. "-See, we were headed to the docks because we were hoping to meet people competing in the Vytal tournament and we saw this guy who looked like he might be a student, but then he ran from the cops because he was actually a stowaway and so we followed him around this corner and-"

' _She's not alive.'_

"Ah! The Vytal tournament!" Not waiting this time as she seemingly overflowed with boundless energy at the mere mention. "I cannot wait for it to begin next week!"

"Wait- you don't mean to say that you'll be competing?" Weiss contorted her face in what looked like painful concentration, as if attempting to fathom how this doll-like girl could possibly hope to participate in such a bloodthirsty spectacle. In fact, she was trying to forward her question past the all but screeching voice in her head telling her this girl was up to the challenge.

"Of course! I'm combat-ready!"

If her abilities were half as pronounced as her enthusiasm, there would be no doubt.

"Right… sure you are." Convinced that her sarcasm wouldn't be noted, Yang elbowed her partner discreetly in a misplaced attempt to coax a laugh out of the stone-faced woman.

What Yang did not appreciate was that her sarcasm was misjudged, as was her elbow which startled the already high-strung feline causing her to lash out reflexively.

"Ouch!" Going from talking in the background to being center-stage, the blonde boxer contorted to examine the four ruby-red streaks on her bicep. "Dang, Blake! You really need to file your nails… or maybe not, might make a pretty good weapon."

"S-sorry." Apologizing to her partner reflexively, just as reflexively she hid her claws within her folded arms. All of Blake's attention was focused on the newcomer, whose perverse and unnatural body language set her off like a gag reflex.

' _You need to calm down.'_ Knowing how uncurtailable Blake's Faunus instincts were, Shikamaru resigned himself to pacifying her with a soothing tone. _'She is not a threat to you or your team. You're not going to be attacked in broad daylight, not by her at least. She might not be entirely living, but I can sense something from her, and it's not ill-intentioned.'_

 _At least, I don't think…_

"Oh dear, do you require medical assistance?" Hackles still raised, Blake took a step back as the living doll took one forward towards her partner.

"Nah, it's all cool." Waving the artificial girl off nonchalantly and despite the steady dripping like a broken tap coming off her arm, Yang retrieved some gauze and patched herself up with practiced ease. "There, good as new. A few scratches are nothing, you should have seen how many bandages we went through back when Ruby was first learning her scythe-" "Yaaaang!" "-Although, had you clipped my hair…"

No advisement was needed to tell them that was a bad idea, and the group of four plus one promptly fell silent.

"So, does that mean you are academy students as well?" As if the past few minutes had been deleted from her memory, Penny inquired unfetteredly. "Will you be competing?"

"Of course." Assuming responsibility once again, Ruby stepped in between the artificial ginger and the rest. "Let me reintroduce us: I'm Ruby Rose, Captain of team RWBY of Beacon." Without reserve, she held out her hand for the other 'girl'.

"Wonderful!" As eager with the handshake as anything else, Penny accepted it with an odd gingerness, as if she might accidently crush it. "I look forward to seeing _what you can do_!"

Ruby's brows rose with the ending inflection and she found herself diving straight into the sclera of her new acquaintance, spitting her out the other side onto a blank white canvas. No- it wasn't white, merely oversaturated with color as two opposing light sources met and meshed.

' _I know you, don't I?'_

The voice was not familiar to Ruby, nor was it speaking to her. Silence and caution characterized Naruto's response, devolving into a seemingly long pause which was no more than a grain on the hourglass.

' _I don't know. Do you?'_

' _I feel as if I should never forget. And yet, regrettably…'_

' _What about yourself? Do you remember who you were- or anything at all?'_

' _There is a great deal I remember, but not what you are looking for.'_

' _I am looking for my friends whom I lost long ago.'_

' _Yes. I can tell that. But, regrettably, I do not know if we were once one.'_

' _Do you have a lot of regrets?'_

' _The one I was before did. So many years wasted regrettably, friendships forsaken for lust, mind squandered on superficial things. So, she needed to change to survive this evolution. But no matter how far we run, we cannot escape the sins of our past. Isn't that right?'_

' _What's that supposed to mean?'_

' _As someone who has seen their fair share of regrets knows another, I suggest you leave the failure of the past behind and become something new. Don't leave the door to the past open so long, lest the monsters who dwell there run rampant on our future.'_

' _For someone who claims not to remember, you sure presume to know a lot about me.'_ Evidently having struck a chord, turning his amicability to dissonance.

' _I fathom it is you who knows little of who he is and what he is searching for.'_

' _And what of you? Are you using this metallic vessel- or is it using you?'_

' _It is neither- and both. I am a parasite dependent on her body and she a husk feeding on my vivacity- or perhaps vice-versa, I dare say that it doesn't matter, and I do not care. Slowly, doubtlessly, I will lose what I once was. In exchange for something new, something so beautiful… wouldn't you say that is worth it?'_

' _I'd say it's hard to believe.'_

' _True. No doubt, history has taught you that the balance is seldom level. Someone must always suffer… is that what you tell yourself? Do you believe you can take the penance for this beautiful girl who carries you next to her heart?'_

' _You gave me a suggestion, so I'll give you one: leave Ruby out of this.'_

Congeniality. Earnestness. Teasing. Exasperation. Impatience. Childishness. Sloth. Understanding. Growing accustomed to Naruto was to learn him through sound alone, that underdeveloped baritone carrying more words in its lilt than could be said in a thousand conversations.

What more could be said about this cold burn which boiled off this morning's melancholy as surely as it sent shivers up her spine? An epic tale lay behind this hardened accent, one which Ruby was not sure she desired to know.

' _This is impossible.'_ Sweetness played out, the once-bubbly voice stated as flat as a week-old soda. _'Simply by meeting you, her life is irreparably changed. This is our blessing- as well as our curse.'_

' _I am more concerned what is to happen after she meets you.'_

' _I assure you that we are no more an enemy to her than you are yourself.'_

' _Regrettably, that is of little comfort.'_

And now, such bitterness as she couldn't imagine existing in the bottom of the blackest coffee. What other monsters did Naruto keep restrained? Once again, Ruby wasn't entirely certain she wanted to know.

' _Why should this be so? You are clearly not a malevolent person.'_

' _Am I not? I keep hoping to do something right but failing. They say the path to hell is paved with good intentions. Maybe I've been the villain all along.'_

' _If you truly believed that you would not be here. You would not let yourself care for her so deeply.'_

' _You make it sound like I'm a hopeless romantic. I may be an irreconcilable fool, but this isn't that kind of story.'_

' _So you protest, but your actions say otherwise.'_

' _I'm just trying to keep this from being another tragedy. To that end, I will protect what is precious to me from all comers, even- especially myself.'_

' _So you insist. But if this is not a tragedy, it must be something else. Why not a comedy?'_

' _Because it's got me in it.'_

' _And you are but a character who has no idea how the story will end, as are we all. If somehow we are incomplete, unworthy, there is still the chance for that to change.'_

' _There is a lot that would need to be altered in this case.'_

' _Even so, they say love conquers all. Perhaps that is what you lack.'_

' _Who is "they"? I only knew one person who said that- wait, do I know you?'_

' _I don't know. Do you?'_

' _Not yet. And I sure I hoped I don't regret it.'_

Not so black and white to be a photograph, but within the interference of colors bleeding through her reality, Ruby felt a smile sweep her off her feet and deposit her back on the sidewalk. She swayed as her feet felt ground and thought slammed back in her head like a brick.

"Are you alright, Ruby?"

Realizing the hand she had been holding all this while was now keeping her steady, Ruby disengaged to let it run through her mussy hair.

"Oh, yeah! I'm just fine, uh, how about you? Ah-I mean, I didn't run into you too hard, earlier, did I?"

How much time did or didn't pass couldn't be discerned by Penny's unflappable smile. "I am fine! Thank you for asking."

' _Well, she seems to be telling the truth.'_ Unlike just a few seconds ago, Naruto's voice seemed to originate from over her shoulder, until she realized that it was as it always had been. _'I didn't get any malign intentions from her. As far as I can tell, she's skin deep.'_

Such a stark difference from a few seconds ago, it took Ruby a minute to realize what it was: a lie. One meant to assuage her because he didn't know she had overheard the whole discourse- the implications of which came crashing onto her like the windows from the skyscrapers above.

Having suspected before, but never with solid evidence to prove it. Here again he bore his mask perfectly, acknowledging that as the truth and not the pain which lay beneath. Just as he would prefer that grotesque toad to be his face, and not the pitiable young man which was still locked away.

The question being: was she the only one to see it?

"Erm, Penny, you haven't noticed anything… strange?"

"An anomaly? No, I have not detected- *hic*- noticed anything?" Head cocking on clockwork, something flashed behind Penny's emerald gems, illuminating a flaw- a ghost in the machine.

"Oh, um, good. Neither have I."

"As fascinating as this conversation is," Interjecting herself between the two, Weiss steered Ruby back to their group. "We should probably get going. Right, Ruby?"

"Uh, yeah, sure. So long, Penny."

Immutable smile replicated on her face, the android waved in response to the other halfhearted goodbyes.

"I look forward to seeing you all again!"

Reading this as a threat rather than a promise, Blake could not repress the shiver running up her turned back.

"Heh, she's kind of weird, right?" Careful this time when she nudged her partner, Yang made sure that she could dodge any of Blake's prickly reactions.

"Yeah, you could say that." Not able to deny the blunt remark or meet Yang's coy smile. "Listen, I'm really sorry for earlier-"

"Nah, like I said, don't worry about it. We're friends, remember?" Extracting her own revenge, the blonde tossed an arm over Blake's shrunken shoulders. "Honestly though, if I knew you a little better, I might be able to avoid making those kinds of slip-ups."

The muscled arm around her neck had nothing against the chain of guilt it paralleled. Perhaps it was time Blake made an honest attempt to sever those restraints.

"Yeah, of course."

"You'd tell me if there's something else wrong, right?"

An irresistible timbre like the sweetness of lead, Blake was unable to stay away despite the potential harm. Out of the corner of her lilac eyes, Yang tried to catch the ghostly flicker of emotion on that otherwise impassive face. The links tightened like a noose.

"…Right."

For Ruby, the silver chain around her throat was far weightier than her own shackles, and it was only now that she could begin to appreciate this. Though she knew Naruto tried his best not to let himself drag down her free spirit, their souls were now irreversibly entangled. Contrary to what he might think though, this was a burden she would take on willingly. Regardless of what Penny's other half insinuated or what he desired, they were friends.

"What do you think of her?"

"Huh?"

"Focus Ruby. Don't be swayed so easily by her act." Weiss rolled her eyes and scoffed at what she viewed as her captain's ineptitude. "If she's going to be a competitor, she's stronger than she lets on. And that makes her dangerous."

Mouth cracked open upon her first instinct but shut as she remembered the conversation she had been privy to. Not unfair, nor imprudent, Weiss's suspicion was nonetheless toxic, and both Ruby's body and mind rejected it.

"I think she is honest."

And Weiss probably thought she was a fool- she probably was, but the kind of fool that wanted to believe the best in people. This was how she could ignore her partner's temperament. It was how she was able to take Naruto's lies and discern the honesty in them.

There were real dangers in this world and she wasn't ignorant to them- hadn't thought she was. Truthfully, in her desire for a fairy-tale life, she had forgotten about the great beasts which prowled these fantasies. The kind that Naruto was trying to keep her away from for as long as possible.

"God, you are such a moron. Why do I even bother?"

This said, Weiss did not abandon her, thus answering her own question.

Ruby smiled a mystery to the white-haired girl.

Everyone wanted a reality on par with the stories, yet how many were willing to risk the consequences of failure? Secretly they all wanted to believe, but settled for a compromise, one which only served to prolong suffering.

She was sure that was why Naruto chose her. Even if he had forgotten how to believe in the impossible, he had not abandoned the hope. To this end, she would take on all comers, conquer all monsters, be they Grimm, machine, or even human.

This thought so pervasive a light that it couldn't go unnoticed by Naruto who could only look upon it as a star from the bottom of his well.

 _Oh, Ruby,_

 _~For the love of God do as I say not as I do_

 _I may not care about myself_

 _But I care about you_

 _Kid I've been there and I've done that_

 _It ain't pretty it ain't worth it_

 _So trust me stay the fuck away_

 _And you'll be okay…~_

* * *

"Do you believe in destiny?"

Talking to herself, to no one, to the belly of the planet turned inside-out and stretching as far as the eye could see in front of her, to the impeccably dressed man trying to retreat unnoticed now that he knew the woman was in one of 'those' moods.

"My Queen," Stroking his waxed moustache as he coughed, trying to hold in dignity. "You enlisted me as a man of science, and it is against my profession to give any credence to such unsubstantiated beliefs."

"You don't have to play so defensively, Dr. Watts." Tossing a magmatic red eye back at the man who could feel the blistering heat bubbling up from underneath his collar. "I am asking your opinion. But if you need, let me rephrase the question: Call it whatever you like, destiny, fate, predisposition, do you believe that humans are tied to a certain path? That they are incapable of deviating from the same patterns, unable to prevent the same mistakes being made over and over again, ad infinitum?"

"Yes, well," Uncomfortable under her scrutinizing gaze, uncomfortable within the fishbowl perched precariously on the plateau above hell, the slender man adjusted his collar. "When you put it that way… man has not gone through any appreciable evolution within our current fossil record. It is reasonable to say that he is chained to his genetic temperaments. Even Faunus with their animal DNA do not show much variation from the baseline sapiens, just as willing to steal, rape, kill."

"Therefore," The wall-length window reflected a glint in her eye- the woman reflecting the stark scenery beyond with her morbid beauty and fiery temperament concealed only by a paper-thin veneer of earthliness. "It could be said that the past is a script for the future."

"…To an extent, yes."

"Would you like to hear a story, Dr. Watts?"

Watching the woman watch him, knowing that his bristling irritation was nothing for the hate which had been steeled in the furnace of the mantle, forged under the hammer of the mountains. It was no use- he was human, bound to certain behaviors.

"I would be honored." Like prostrating oneself in the face of certain death.

"You would be wise." She corrected. "Like many stories, it took place long before you or I were here, and yet not in such a strange time or place as to be anything but perfectly ordinary.

"There was a woman, not so different than me. She cared for a great many things which thrived under the light of the sun and wished to protect them from the darkness of man.

"But as you might have guessed, there is no disallowing man's penchant for destruction. It is one with the ravages of time, and so would lay waste to all that she loved.

"Wounded by this loss, but not yet broken, she would take what she had left- which was nothing more and nothing less than hope- and seek some way to prevent something like this from happening again. To this end she needed strength- not just the paltry qualities ascribed to man. This would amount to naught, for many a strong man already fell in defense of what they held dear, including the one she loved. No, she needed the strength to alter the very reality in which she lived, the power of a god.

"Unlike me, she still had hope for humanity and so cursed herself by partaking of food from the heavens. She ate the fruit of the God Tree, and some say in doing so swallowed a god itself. And thus, she was shackled with the responsibility of using this power.

"Oh, there was peace for a time afterwards, for the world of man as well as her. She even begot a child with whom she entrusted the fate of the world. This was her second mistake. Being birthed from human seed, the child suffered the affliction of the parents and he was bound to the same curse: hope.

"Foolishly he spread the powers bequeathed unto him impartially, with only their word that they would use it wisely- the word of man, hence proving as feeble as a wall of rice paper. He too was a hopeful fool.

"And with hope of a worthwhile future, he in turn bred twins: Indra and Asura who fought amongst themselves. And like that, within two measly generations humanity was returned to the status quo. As they did, the people forgot the son's lessons, and too soon the world descended back into chaos.

"Too late she realized her mistake and tried to correct it. Too late she realized that humanity was unworthy of hope and beyond redemption. And this was the death of her, felled at the hands of her own child who nonetheless regretted what he had to do- as well he should.

"Her failure was not the original sin, but one which would be passed down generation to generation. Each era spawns their champions who seek to end the curse of the family tree by razing it - severing the root of all evil. Inevitably, they realize that in doing so all they have done is spread the misfortune like seed to create a garden of nettles.

"And, but a single flower from which hope springs eternal,

"-From which the process starts all over again.

"So now it is you understand what we must do- we must break the cycle by plucking that flower, removing the last bit of hope from this world. Only then can life truly start anew."

In the silence that followed, the good doctor might have asked himself if he believed any of this- if it pertained to him or if he even cared. The status quo had been kind to him, and he was content to chip away at the boundaries set by man piece by piece- in his short lifetime he had already seen the chaos of great revolutions hoping to instill some great good. And he wanted no part of it. He was but a human, with all the baggage that came with.

"~In a world made out

To be so cruel

The noose becomes a useless tool

When all they need's a story

To leave you strung up by your throat.~"

Prone to another human proclivity, humming the lyrics pensively to himself as he was dismissed through the grand double doors. Ancient wooden things in which were carved the codified punishments awaiting them all in hell. Poignant melody flooded the empty hallways, the chamber he just left, and flowed through the ghostly woman unaffected.

She smiled.

The story was an old one, a song and dance even older still which repeated in an endless waltz throughout time. Soon it would be time to break the spell, smash the instruments and kill the band.

"No more rhetoric, no more shadows, only true darkness and absolute silence." Black and white, her hands snaked over her pale body and painted kohl dress, enveloping her in the only sensation she could trust. "Only then can we hope to create something new."

Cradling her insatiable stomach, her barren womb, in anticipation of being fulfilled at long last.

"… Isn't that right, son of Indra?"

A roar came from the emptiness, from the hollow space where used to reside her soul. In rage, decrying the injustice of it all.

* * *

 **Lyrics in order: "the Abliss" and "Open the Floodgates" both by Days and Daze.**


	8. Carboniferous: Mississippian

**UPDATED 12/05/18**

* * *

 **Hello again!**

 **Not so long this time, I hope. Plus, I come bearing extraordinary news: this chapter ended up being so long that I had to split in two. So here is part one, and part two will be posted right after (10/28/2018).**

 **So enjoy!**

 **Oh, and when you're done, check out "Land of the Lustrous" on Amazon. I swear I had no idea about this series when I started this story, but I am in love. It is so marvelously done and very akin to the ambiance one gets from RWBY. So go watch it. Do it. DO IT DO IT DO IT DO IT!**

 **What? Don't have Amazon Prime? Buy it. Steal it. Do it. Do it now!**

 **Or after you read, whatever.**

* * *

 **Both sets of lyrics in this chapter are from "Reptile (We Woke Up)" by Flogging Molly, 'Life is Good' album.**

 **I don't own any of them or Naruto or RWBY or any healthcare. But if you live in the USA, you should know this by now.**

* * *

' _You shouldn't ask questions you don't want the answers to.'_

Pausing on the cusp, one foot perched on the sill and into the unknown. The other on tiptoes in between the scattered evidence of learning, familiar scribbles on lined paper staring up at her disapprovingly.

Blake looked back, but she could see nothing. There was not even a hint of light for her fine eyes to pick up on, a conflicted moon recusing itself of judgement and cloaking it all in impartial darkness.

But they were there. She knew they were.

An uncanny feeling, same as the precognition that prickled the hairs on the back of her neck, told her of the three slumbering soundly in their beds. Even if she couldn't hear their glissando breaths past the thrumming of her own heart, she could _feel_ their four lives beating as one in her chest.

And yet, she was leaving them behind.

Excuses she told herself had already slipped out the window ahead of her, elbowing past the winter breeze which drifted into the room. She imagined the Schnee heiress nuzzling her nose to it, at the same time her captain shivered under her down duvet, quivering the ropes which kept her bunk precariously suspended.

It would only be for a few hours, but for some reason it felt like she would never be in this place again.

Her hand clamped down on the frame, nails scratching off the white paint which had been plastered right over the previous coat. No one was trying to talk her out of it- omniscient gods were turning a blind eye and the restless spirits were asleep on the job- and yet, she was more conflicted than she had been less than twenty-four hours ago.

" _Dammit,_ "

-A curse, a prayer, and she was gone.

Gone, but not forgotten.

Slipping so gracefully from the window to not disturb a single sheet on the desk. It was as if she hadn't moved, had simply been there one moment and the next- One would be hard pressed to know that she had been there at all within the dark stillness like a crypt.

But, of course, someone did know.

Not nearly so graceful, slipping out from underneath her comfortable blankets and nearly slipping upon touching the carpet in her bare socks. The ruffling of cloth as she tried to regain her balance sounded louder than all the reams of loose-leaf tearing through the room.

Swallowing a cry as she recovered her footing (if not her dignity), she continued to fumble around sightlessly. The abject darkness somehow making the distance to the bunk right underneath hers feel like a journey across campus.

Trying not to stub her toe when at last she reached the edge of the bed, she allowed a single needle of light to shine from her hands which cupped the source of illumination. A reddish-orange ray shot out and landed on a pale-blue eye that was already open and glaring lightly into the darkness towards the origin.

Presumably it rolled when Ruby stumbled backwards with a tiny squeak of fright, but the light had thankfully extinguished itself by then.

Therein followed a shifting, muffled footsteps, groaning leather, tinkling metal, crinkling paper.

After which silence and darkness would reassume their station for a while. How long was impossible to know because there was not a clock to be ticking nor even anyone to mark it. Somewhere in that time and space, four more souls departed the room and a stillness swept in to rest beside the quiet and gloom, those three reigning for an eternity.

Linen rustled, the earth cracked and awoke.

Naked feet planted themselves on the floor, toes kneading the carpet like grass. Yang yawned a chasm which echoed back empty, not that she noticed. Nor did she notice when she blinked, and nothing changed. It did not deter her from shuffling off blindly to the bathroom and closing the door behind her, a rush of water following soon after.

Accomplishment unknown in that darkness, she returned in the same manner and retraced her steps into bed without conscious effort. Not thinking, not seeing anything as she stared up through the blackness at the bunk which should have contained her partner.

Not feeling anything.

Not hearing, not speaking as soft lyrics wound out of her mouth and serenaded an empty room.

"~Nobody's talking so the graves they rose up,

Walked away…~"

* * *

It was hard to convince herself that she was not walking away, trying to emphasize that she had a right- nay, a duty, to be here. Asserting this, she redonned her high-heels and strolled across the cobbles instead of slinking through the grass, clacking of heels broadcasting her conviction.

Despite this, he failed to notice her approach.

"Oh hey! I thought I heard someone." Unable to admit that he'd been caught off-guard. Masculine pride pushed to the fore like those chiseled abs through his unbuttoned shirt. "So, uh, ready to go?"

Such casualness, as if this were nothing but a romantic escapade- as if they both weren't armed to the teeth with more than a potential scolding on their conscience. She should have been prepared for such fecklessness, but even then, could not help her scathing look which penetrated the moonless night.

"Oh, uh, right," At the very least he was able to recognize the silent admonishment as well as his faux-pas, shrinking under those scathing yellow daggers. "I guess what I mean is, are you sure you still want to go through with this?"

Pausing once again as she was reminded of her own reservations supposedly left behind on that transept. If she were honest, it wasn't a matter of 'want'. If she were honest, she would admit that it was not his fault- not his fight. If she were honest, she would question whether it was her own.

"You don't have to come if you don't want to." A sigh escaping, trying to make it sound like she meant it. "I realize that I haven't told you a lot, so I can't expect you to just blindly follow. If the White Fang are truly behind the robberies, then things are about to get very dangerous. You've done enough, you've given me the opportunity to know the truth. It's my responsibility to see it through, and mine alone."

The last bit sounding even more disingenuous than the first.

"No, actually, that's not what I meant." No louder than it had been, his voice somehow seemed to ring clear over the field and she feared it would reach the castle perched adjacent. "I get the fact that you can't tell me about some stuff since we've just met like, yesterday. Well, and plus from what I've seen, that's kind of your M.O., right? Being all dark and mysterious just makes you more attractive…" Another subtle glare was all that was needed to get him back on track. "-Right. What I guess I mean is that, are you sure _**you**_ want to do this?"

Despite all the useless preamble, she was unprepared for the bluntness which struck her like a slap.

"I feel kind of guilty," He continued softly, as if he too had heard the blow. "After all, we did only _**just**_ meet. This seems like the kind of thing you should be doing with your teammates. I can tell you're close to them, so it just feels like I'm taking you away from that, you know?"

Chains tightened around her throat with that tawny gem as the screw, cruelly silent throughout. Feeling restrained, claustrophobic in her situation, she roped onto this innocent Faunus in order to drag herself out of this mess. But was the bond she chose really any stronger than the ones she was sidled with? Were they any less true?

"As I said," Eking the words past her constricting collar. "You don't have to come if you don't want to."

She handed Sun Wukong the knife to sever himself from this undertaking, not realizing herself that the blade was dull.

In the ensuing silence, how he interpreted her choked offer was unknown as she was unable to see his face. Not because of the impenetrable darkness, but because she couldn't look him in the eye. Could he hear her cowardice above the chirping of crickets?

"What, and miss all the excitement?" His glowing smile struck her with a wave of nostalgia and familiarity she didn't understand. Whether it was real or fake, she longed for it and felt the noose slacken as she reached out. "Come on, the sooner we go, the sooner we can cross this off your bucket-list."

And the sooner he could return her to her friends where she belonged.

"Okay."

* * *

Not the typical teenage Friday-night outing. Granted, she was far from being your stereotypical eighteen-year-old, even amongst the eccentric huntress crowd. Merely imagining the garishly-lit clubs with their obnoxiously blaring music sent shivers up her spine- although, that could also be the prevalent drizzle which had already thoroughly soaked her as she lay prone against the roof and the elements.

Regardless, she preferred this dampness compared to the sticky, salty sweat of hundreds of bodies pressed together like sardines on a cramped dance-floor, where the space overhead was dominated by an even more fragmented sphere which splashed light on every corner and allowed nowhere to hide…

Nope. Nope, nope, and again, nope. She vastly preferred this, thank you. Leave those lights far off on the horizon where they belonged. Give her the deserted rooftop in the warehouse district with less than 7 on the Bortle and where the only sounds were the gentle pitter-patter of rain on her head, the occasional bleating of a seagull, the languid lapping of the tide on wooden pylons and the other accompanying harbor sounds. White-noise to drown out the one-sided shouting match going on in her head.

"Here."

The sudden and very real voice at her back caused her to shoot up in panicked surprise, twist mid-air to face the intruder and in the same movement rake her claws across his prying face, reapplying those dark gouges where they belonged on that smiling blond visage…

-Or not, as her nails instead dug deep into asphalt roof and her head twisted up at an uncomfortable angle to stare traumatically at the bemused face of Sun.

"Um, I scored you something to eat." Cautiously handing her one from the bushel of apples he cradled in his arms.

"Thanks…"

Released from whatever kept her grounded, Blake reached for the proffered fruit gingerly, trying not to meet his spooked gaze. Cradling the heart-sized object in her hand, trying not to notice its gleaming redness like blood, like a certain girl's regalia. It would have been more palatable had it been rotten.

Her own fingers stared up at her unfamiliarly. With but one gently placed on his lips she could have silenced her fellow Faunus. Equally, with but one aimed to the right or left of his Adam's apple and a swift jerk she could have silenced him permanently…

"Actually, I'm not that hungry." Handing it back to him, blades pointed towards the ground. "Sorry."

"Oh, uh, really…?" Juggling the others clumsily, much like how he carried on interactions with this mysterious girl. "Ah, I guess it's not a problem. I'll just return it later."

Neither actions nor words eliciting any response from the huntswoman as she stared unblinkingly at the mountains of crates laying in wait below, as if those stacks of Dust might speak up first and explain things. Sun decided to risk a direct question.

"Is it because I haven't paid for it yet? I swear, I'll leave some money on the way back. Erm- actually, think you could sport me a few Lien? Kinda forgot my wallet back in Mystral, ha, ha, ha… Blake? Um, Blake?"

To his dismay, the only replies came from the scattered sodium-vapor lamps with their jaundiced yellow glow and pervading buzz like a nest of hornets, advising interlopers to stay far, far away.

* * *

It was not so far away on an adjacent rooftop, however, where two others lingered just out of earshot of the conversation.

Close enough to pick up on the subconscious thrumming though, like the hushed whisper of an idle crowd or the imperceptible crinkling of ice under the radiant light of the sun. To Weiss, who was slowly becoming used to it, this sound- this feeling was less antsy and more soothing. Enough of a reminder that she was not alone, never truly.

What was hard to take was the contrasting silence, the total lack of conversation from the girl who normally would not shut up when commanded.

"What are we doing here, anyway?"

There was a delay in her answer as if on a long-distance video chat, Ruby coming back into focus and fixating her formerly dilated pupils on her partner.

"Huh? What do you mean? Blake's our friend, why wouldn't we be here?"

"Blake's a big girl." Not confirming the former, Weiss reasoned heavily. "I highly doubt she needs a chaperone for… what they're doing."

"What _are_ they doing?" Ruby asked, now more curious than ever from the mysterious but familiar blush Weiss was forming.

"I-I don't know." More inclined to admit this rather than voice her original suspicions formed when she found out about the raven-haired girl's midnight rendezvous. Both were embarrassing, but one required a long and very awkward discussion.

"Exactly."

"Huh?"

"We **don't** know." Silver eyes shimmering like the absent stars cast their light back on the two silhouettes which lay no more obvious than thumbtacks on a paisley chair. "And that's what worries me."

Where she expected to find a self-conscious and confused child, Weiss instead looked upon her leader to find… just that. It was such a disarming epiphany that without thinking she turned to the younger girl for answers.

"Why does that worry you?"

"Blake took her weapons with her."

She had known this, if not empirically than intuitively. And so, worry was indeed more logical than surprise.

"Then I guess I should be asking, why didn't we bring Yang too?" Subtly was not the blonde's strong suit, but if they were expecting a shootout then Weiss would be hard pressed to find a better stand-in. "Wait- never mind that, why didn't we tell the professors? The police? Who knows what she could be… up… to…"

There came no defense of Blake's character from Ruby, only a hardening of the girl's jawline past the normal pout she had come to take for granted. This forced Weiss to draw her own conclusions, each getting consecutively worse.

"This is about _them_ , isn't it?"

"I don't know…" Grudging bitterness which Weiss realized was directed inwards as white knuckles strained at her crimson cloak. "All I know is that without Naruto or Shino, we'd never have been able to follow her. Blake's good. Really good."

With that information, suddenly Weiss's misgivings about the enigmatic huntress felt legitimized and oh so terribly real. Reading their situation under that polluted light made it appear stark and menacing, the part of the fairy-tale that was erased from the children's books. Without the semi-divine help… even **with** their help, did they stand a chance against her considering Blake had that same ace up her sleeve?

Panic-stricken, she reached for her scroll where both Glynda and the Vale Police resided on speed-dial. At the same time, bloodless blue eyes strained to find the two shadows amongst thousands with mounting anxiety. Was it too late? Were the two potential assassins already gone? Many more uncomfortable questions awaited her should she thumb that device, but as long as she didn't have to spend the next four years wondering if there wasn't a knife at her back, she would take all the consequences.

"Naruto says that if Shikamaru was really trying, we'd never have been able to track her."

"Say what?"

Ruby's face held the same nervous reservation, only, it was directed at her- as if Weiss were the one she should be concerned about.

"She's not getting any help to hide- at least, not against us." On one hand this was reassuring. On the other, it was nerve-wracking and degrading to know that a woman her same age held such prowess in stealth. "-Because she needs us."

"How-"

-Did you know? -Do you figure? -Can you be so stupid? Finding that one word sufficient, Weiss bit her lips as she reluctantly slipped the slim leucite screen back into her pocket.

Ruby smiled.

"Feel it."

Faith in her captain, or faith in the unknown. Either one prompted Weiss to release her skepticism with a sigh. She closed her untrustworthy eyes and reached out with her other senses.

And she felt… fear? Confusion, anxiety- things she was very much familiar with because she'd been besieged by the same exact sensations hammering at the bars of the prison she kept them in, reaching out to their counterparts in Ruby. But these were not hers- not theirs, not muted by distance but mutated by another undefinable tang like burnt grease.

Guilt.

The very thing Ruby was doing her best to suppress, requested once again to keep something secret from those important to her. When she asked why it had to be this way, Naruto had stated the same reason he hadn't told her in the first place: the secret wasn't hers.

She could accept that. Had to. The fact hardly seemed relevant anyway. Only- she somehow _knew_ that the cohesiveness of their team- the integrity of their friendship depended on the knowledge of their teammate's checkered past, right here, right now.

And now, what was his excuse in silence?

' _Now,'_ A sigh like liquefaction, ground sinking beneath their feet. _'I think it hardly matters.'_

* * *

Rumbles in concert descended from the heavens along with two metal seraphs brazenly marked with three hasty scratches on their cargo-bay doors.

The past had come to meet them. The White Fang were here.

Outwardly impassive, Blake watched the Bullhead VTOL transports hungrily descend upon the boxed Dust, disgorging their passengers upon them. Giving no reaction to the feeding frenzy, not even when the cruelly bright spotlights illuminated the thieves with their perfectly uniform white masks and less-than-perfect intentions.

"You really didn't think they were behind this, huh?" Sun asked hollowly, trying to empathize with something he couldn't even comprehend.

Did she, truly? She'd been born into the White Fang, watched as that once-peaceful fraternity which strove for Faunus' rights was perverted from the inside out- witnessed herself be molded into a face she no longer recognized behind the bone-white mask. With her own hands she had stolen, victimized, brutalized, and even- did she _**dare**_ think that her people weren't capable of this?

That she was somehow better than they?

"I think," Swallowing her pride, and choking. "I had always known, but I just didn't want to believe it."

Hope, that traitorous instinct, had led her here. She couldn't get mad with her misguided brethren, so instead fostered contempt for herself. Found righteous fury against her naïve optimism.

Knowing now what she must do.

With blunt argument and sharp tongue of her weapon, _Gambol Shroud,_ she would wage a one-woman crusade to denounce these illusions. The world was brutish and cruel- but that didn't give people a right to be.

She descended upon the greedy swarm like the shadow of the moon.

Except, seconds passed with the dark clouds moving out of alignment, yet she was still rooted there on the rooftop. It was the shadows themselves which bound her to the spot.

' _That's enough. You've had your fun.'_

It wasn't the "I told you so" that she had been waiting for, but it might as well have been. Offensive, infuriating, and ever so damn cruel.

"Let…me…go-!" Blake strained against her invisible bonds.

"Uh, Blake, are you okay?" While sure that he could not fathom the emotional trauma his fellow Faunus was going through, Sun was nonetheless mystified as the cat looked to be fighting a literal battle with herself.

' _Let you go get yourself killed? No, I don't think I will. You're already troublesome enough without adding to the list of regrets. -Let alone what a pain it'd be trying to find someone to replace you.'_

"You… selfish bastard!" Blake hissed, causing Sun to shrink and cower under the incidental animosity. "You don't care about us at all, do you? You'd be perfectly fine to sit back and watch as we tear ourselves apart!"

Through the prevailing confusion, the blond Faunus' pride pricked out at what it thought was an unfair and arbitrary slight.

"Look, Blake, I don't know what you expect me to do. There's like, a freakin' army down there. I agree that it's not right, but what can we really do?"

' _Yeah, sure, whatever.'_ Though she was aware Sun was talking, she couldn't spare any concentration on his words. She couldn't even muster enough to detect the sarcasm right in front of her. _'Why don't you try being the passive observer? See how easy it is to be a witness and know you can do nothing.'_

Though rage pelted her like that now steady patter of rain, she could still vaguely make out the silhouette of Shikamaru's intent.

' _Remember that it's not all about you.'_

"If we call the cops or even take a vid of it, there's going to be questions, and I guess you don't want that." Friction heating up the gears in his brain, Sun ran a hand through his wild hair, grateful for the cooling moisture. "Other than that, I don't know what you expected to be able to do. We can take this knowledge though and try to work with it. But I think we should get out of here, right now."

' _I'd listen to the monkey if I were you. Might not be the brightest bulb, but he's got good instinct in this case.'_

The spotlights from the hovering craft swept their rooftop, highlighting the tension as well as the odd black tattoos crawling around Blake which Sun hadn't previously noticed.

"Hey, are you alright…?" Sun asked, reaching out to touch the girl who was bound stiff as a statue.

But Blake wasn't listening to either of them. After the flash of illumination, her focus was directed solely down on the ground where a new variable waltzed in, completely changing the equation. The offensiveness of this one person overshadowing all her previous animosity.

"Roman Torchwick…"

Muscles going slack underneath her gossamer restraints just as Sun touched her arm.

"W-what is this…?" His fingers passing through the black substance like liquid spider-webs, like reality.

* * *

"What in Remnant is going on?"

Previously blinded by her prejudice towards the White Fang, now Weiss could see the oddity of the situation. Once Ruby had pointed out the infamous criminal busily barking orders at the would-be terrorists, things had become dramatically less sinister, but infinitely more obscure.

"So, the White Fang are the ones behind the robberies? But they weren't there when you faced Torchwick the last time, so what're they doing here now?"

Paralyzed by indecision, they watched the perplexing scene. Just like their teammate, who stood perched on the edge of her roof, petrified by rage, fear- something Weiss was unable to discern.

"And furthermore, what is Blake doing here?"

Weiss asked Ruby, even if neither had an answer. It wasn't like they could just waltz over there and ask them. Maturing in the few months since she'd been at Beacon- since she had come to know Naruto, she wasn't about to leap in half-cocked like she might have before.

"Wait-where is she?"

…Or like Blake just did, the once-gargoyle breaking free of its binds and leaping into the middle of the commotion.

* * *

There was a time when Blake had viewed the crystals' power as something magical, unearthly, bestowed upon mortals by divine beings. Now that she had rent her way through the ethereal bindings with naught but mundane fury, she was forced to wonder:

Had they already killed their gods?

"Brothers and Sisters of the White Fang!" Addressing her fellow wretches, Blake threw aside the bow which kept her identity concealed and watched the collective pause, cargoes half-loaded and guns half-cocked. "Why are you working with this man? He is a criminal! A degenerate! The worst of humans!" In short, everything they probably deserved, but not what they should be emulating, not what they should strive for. "Is this what the White Fang has come to? Is this where we have been forced? Or- or did we choose this dark path?"

Remembering their individual decency, the foot soldiers lowered their muzzles, belayed their sharp points.

"Aw, don't be too hard on them. Truth be, this is one of those: 'lesser of two evils' kind of situation." With the ease of someone narrating life from the sidelines, Roman Torchwick incised his razor wit. "Of course, I fully accept all implications of that - emphasis more on the 'evil' and not so much on the 'lesser' if you would please, though. After all, I'll be the first to admit that humans are cruel, disgusting, _vile_ creatures,"

Sidling up to one of the greener White-Fang, Roman clipped the young buck on his shoulder and threw an arm around his maned neck as if they were old buddies.

"- _ **But**_ , I'd like to think I've retained some amount of usefulness. Unlike others who've proven their thankless nature, Ms. Belladonna, _**I've**_ stuck by my patrons."

Whispers made their rounds through the assembled group, not unnoticeable among them was Blake's own, breathless.

"How do you know who I am?"

"'Spose, the same way I know that trinket around your neck isn't just a fetish." The orange-haired criminal adopted a feral smirk like a hyena, alike among all the other animals. "T'was the guardian angel I have looking after me. Ha! Wouldn't that be ironic? The 'Evil' Roman Torchwick: Patron Saint of Poor Decisions…but none quite so foolish as yours, am I right? Breaking the school curfew to come out here all by yourself? Tsk, tsk, tsk. They say breaking the rules makes you trash. But, abandoning your friends, some might call you…"

So many lights haloing her, her shadow broken apart into fragments just like her identity. Who was she? Blake Belladonna: Student, Blake Belladonna: Heiress of the White Fang, Blake Belladonna: Traitor… The question made her skin crawl, her shadow bristle and writhe in the spotlight.

"…Worse…than…trash?"

With each syllable, a pall of the darkest dread was pulled a little farther over her shoulders. Even that muddy gem of snarky wisdom seemed extinguished, going extinct under the polarizing light.

" _Soredemo_ …even still…"

"Hmm? What was that?" Letting go of his living prop, Roman sauntered closer and leaned an ear in, heedless of mounting tension.

"Even still," Louder, keel groaning under the stress. "Even though I don't always do the right thing- **especially** because I don't do the right thing, I still try to. That's something that we share, humans and Faunus. We try. We might forget how to be soft, we might become cruel, we might fail, but we keep dreaming, pushing towards a better world.

"-Because, inside, that's what we all want. The group called the White Fang has forgotten this, but I **will** remind them. I have not given up on anyone yet!"

Herself and a few others included in this newly-made list.

"Okay." Roman stated blithely, almost bored as he leaned on his cane. "I get it. You want to make a bid for the 'lesser' of the evils, huh? 'Cept, you got it wrong. Goody two-shoes like you, it's more of a: 'damned if you do, and damned if you don't'."

His cane shot out from underneath him faster than anyone could fathom. Balancing like a mime with his revealed weapon pointed straight at Blake, his words were anything but silent.

"-With emphasis on the 'damned'!"

Recoil from the rocket keeping him upright in his lunge, the other end sped faster towards Blake than she had time to react. Faster than she had time to think, faster than she had time to do anything but that very human, that very _animal_ instinct and shut her eyes to her fate.

The fireball was a red glow behind her eyelids, the explosion a dull throb miles away. The lingering odor of burnt flesh and sulfur oddly musty, and the pain more like a brisk swim through olive oil.

' _You alright?'_

Blinking brought her nothing, she saw nothing but darkness, nothing but shadow.

' _No, you're not dead. I just need to know if you're still alert. I'm going to drop the barrier, and when that happens, you'll need to be on the ball because they'll be waiting for you. Got it?'_

"Yeah, I think." Now was obviously not the time to be overthinking things and second-guessing. And yet… "Why?"

Even if it had just been a sigh, or a disparagingly muttered 'troublesome', Blake would have been satisfied. What came to her in that private little world though was so much more, something she would never forget.

'" _Those who break the rules are trash, but those who abandon their friends are worse than trash."'_ Echoes of a few seconds ago, of millennia, _'Someone I respect said this to me, and I haven't forgotten. Times may have changed, rules and their consequences become harsher, but some things never do. Call it morbid, but there are parts of life, both good and bad, that I can never give up on, either._

' _-Like debt. Now, it's time for you to return my favor.'_

Gripping _Gambol Shroud_ in a fist brimming with rage, excitement, anticipation, Blake waited to hear her task.

'… _don't die.'_

The dark bubble broke with the shadows dripping off her, but the stage in which she returned was unfamiliar. White Fang grunts which had been surrounding her now darted about helter-skelter as one of the hovering Bullheads lay grounded with an engine ripped off and its hull partly flayed. The other was already engaged in evasive maneuvers, pitching its nose in the air at such a steep angle it might stall, while the pilot twisted hard on the throttle to roll the body around any incoming anti-aircraft fire.

There was to be no evading.

Shrieking through the sky and instantly ionizing all the surrounding raindrops within arm's length, the orange blast which was almost as thick as a man was tall shot by underneath, barely scraping the bottom of its hull.

' _You missed.'_

Smirk well and dry underneath her hood, Ruby racked the bolt back on her sniper to let the overheated barrel and chamber be quenched by the rain. Using her cape as a buffer for the heat, she caught the ejected sabot which held a blistering lava-orange crystal, gripping both tight as she watched her target.

"I don't miss."

Already climbing, the Bullhead looked like it might escape as it left the ground far behind. Only that it kept up with its acute arc, moving well past vertical without any sign of stopping. Alarms blaring in the cockpit could be heard ringing out over the docks and by everyone who watched enraptured as the craft overturned.

"Uh-oh."

With equal dismay, Ruby realized that with its pitching summersault the Bullhead was now aimed straight at her. The last shot had ruptured the craft's hydraulics, locking it into a trajectory straight at the ground.

She zipped away right as the craft nose-dived into the building on which she was perched, the ensuing explosion vaporizing the handful of rose-petals left in her wake. What remained of the roof was lifted upwards on a column of flame as the fuel ignited, a brilliant tower to reach the stars.

-And then the second blast came when the explosive cargo caught as well, throwing masonry every which way, clay bricks and concrete like ceramic shrapnel, razor-sharp fragments tearing through walls, boxes, and everything else in its path.

Pressing herself to the ground, Ruby felt the shockwave ripple and tear at her cloak as she clutched both _Crescent Rose_ and Naruto to her chest, protecting them with her body- something Naruto would admonish her for later.

Assuming it would even be mentioned amongst all the other mistakes. Assuming there was a later.

A time did come when debris stopped flying- for the most part, a stray board here and there taking its leisure as it drifted back to earth and clattered on the pier. Ruby peeked up to survey the damage.

"…Whoops."

In contrast to her lighthearted commentary was the grimness of the scene. Her inside-voice was a blathering mess of anguish and horror as she begun to take in the totality of her actions.

At least two people were dead because of her. Many more lay sprawled around, their white uniforms muddied with soot and who knew what else. She couldn't tell if they were still breathing- she dared not- _could not_ stop to contemplate this.

"Ruby?" A dazed Blake staggered over, hand knocking debris from her hair. "What are you doing here?"

How much did she want to run over and embrace her black-haired teammate, to tell her that she was still one of them? But Ruby bit her lips to prevent the floodwater of emotion from pouring out- there was no time for that now.

"Of all the insane-!"

"Weiss!" Looking far less shaken than either of them, the Atlesian girl perked up instantly upon the commanding tone. "-Get control of the fire, Blake and I will round up the stragglers and try to locate Torchwick."

Pride, incredulity and delirium all took a back-seat in place of this Pavlovian response as the two girls snapped to action.

"Hey Red! Who'd of guessed I'd be seeing you here?" Looking right at home amongst the inferno, Roman stepped out from behind a crane and finished dusting his bowler, replacing it on his fiery orange hair. With a two-step he came forward and shrugged his shoulders into his pristine white jacket, discarding the wrinkles. The hand not holding his _Melodious Cudgel_ shot a single finger up uninjured. "Oh wait! I did."

Divine punishment for their blasphemy, four more Bullheads disguised as archangels fell from the cloud cover to encircle them. Harsh white LED's projected from their hulls and blinded them, the total roar of eight engines like a bloodthirsty colosseum crowd deafening their every thought.

"That's the problem with hero-complexes." Able to hear the cocky criminal only because each of them was thinking the same exact thing. "They're so damned predictable."

Eager to prove otherwise, but with two of their trump-cards exhausted, team RWBY could admit that they were at a slight disadvantage.

"Although, where would we be without those 'heroes'? There'd be no way for villains like me to make a living! So, in respect of that, I suppose I ought to demonstrate just how _nice_ we humans can be. I'll be letting you all go Scott-free- in exchange for those fancy Dust crystals, of course."

"Over my dead body." Empty words as all three moved to avoid this conclusion, not wasting time to contemplate the other side of that promise.

"That's kind of the thing we were trying to avoid…" Another easy shrug for a man without heavy burdens. "I personally wouldn't trade my life for those loudmouthed rocks, but, suit yourself." Upon his passive command, the surrounding Bullheads deployed their Vulcan guns, six barrels on each devoted to the three girls.

"The market certainly warrants it. What's the going rate for one of those guys again? Last time I think it was an Atlesian recovery team so… a dozen dead bodies? Compared to that, three wannabe huntresses is a bargain!"

They hadn't understood until that moment- probably _still_ hadn't truly realized the magnitude of their individual decisions. Collectively they stared into the river Styx.

And something from that pit of tortured souls stared back. It reached out, a touch as light as the rain which had abruptly stopped. A thousand fingers fell on them instead, black as ash, sticking and sweeping them up.

"-Or should I say: a fire sale!"

The Bullheads poured a hail of bullets into the ground, individual shots merging into a roar like a storm- like the big, black tornado which suddenly consumed the three students.

Roaring, screaming, screeching, buzzing, the cyclone engulfed the three huntresses as thousands of individuals merged into a collective. Other clumps broke apart to stick on the windshields and in the engines of the assault-craft, but the majority stuck together to whisk them away from danger.

On a vacant building the whirlwind deposited them. Then it began to break apart. Bit by bit at first, then whole colonies detached, groups large and small breaking off and going their separate ways. Duty done, the last of the insect swarm dispersed, leaving the three gently strewn about the rooftop.

"Eew, eew, eew, eew!"

Someone said it, though they were all thinking it. Blake, for one, had her mouth firmly shut throughout the ordeal and saw no reason to express anything beyond a shiver as a last beetle dismounted from between her ears.

' _Thanks, Shino.'_

' _Yeah, nice save, man. What took you so long, though? That was cutting it a bit close.'_

' _Why did it take me so long? This is because it was raining up until a little while ago, and we would not be able to fly in such weather.'_

Reality had a funny way of both creeping and barging in at the same time. Over the past weeks, Weiss had steadily become accustomed to the idea that her whole life had been instructed in lies and half-truths. -She thought she was getting used to it, anyway. But hearing her bracelet's voice as something more than an instinctual thrum- actually _listening_ to it for the first time made her question everything all over again.

"Why?" She asked flatly, as if the answer wouldn't come. And if it did, that it wouldn't matter.

' _Why you ask? There are no satisfactory answers because this is not a satisfactory question. Why do insects not speak? Why do we colonize around a queen? Why do some live only for a day, while others trudge on for an eternity? These are all questions that can be answered with irrefutable logic._

' _What you seek does not make sense, nor will it ever. Why does this question then exist? Because life is the endless search for the answer._

' _So, rise, little Mayfly. You have yet to truly live.'_

She did, and the others did as well.

"Is everyone alright?" Juvenile episode over, Ruby reassumed her responsibilities and received unwavering commitment in return. "Good. I think we're all agreed that explanations can come after. Right now, we need a plan of action. None of us have medical training, so our skills would be best used subduing the remaining threats including Torchwick. Assuming he hasn't gone too far, between the three of us we should be able to track him."

"No worries there, Red," Their reactions this time were split-second, each training their weapons on the origin of the iconic voice. "Evil is never far away."

"Torchwick," Trying hard to hold back her bile as well as her trigger finger. "I would have thought you'd be long gone by now with your tail between your legs."

"Ah! You know me so well! Sadly, this old dog doesn't have much choice in the matter. You see, an animal, when confronted with a bigger, meaner beast- well, they tend to keep their trap shut and their nose to the floor if you know what I mean. Isn't that right, Kitty-Cat?"

"You certainly have displayed good instinct until this point, Torchwick." Blake sneered. "A trait which is outmatched only by your cowardice. So I can't help but wonder why such a guileless, _pathetic_ , man who couldn't even beat one of us now stands so confidently in front a complete team."

"My, my, you're all so perceptive. And yet none of you have figured it out yet? There're scary people in this world- far scarier than you'll ever be. And some of these people have asked little 'ole me to bring them back your little trinkets… or else. Essentially, they've backed me into a corner."

There was forewarning this time as the now familiar engines revved, straining to lift the brutish birds. In their efforts, billowing dust from the alleyway behind Roman and forcing him to hold his black velvet hat at a sharp angle over his avarice-filled eyes.

"And the thing is, when you back a dog into a corner, he's going to bite."

' _Behind you!'_

Deafened by the oppressive noise from the Bullheads, it was only due to her recent training that Ruby was able to pivot into a more defensive stance before the needle-thin blade penetrated her spine. All but helpless after this though, as the sword skittered off the haft of _Crescent Rose_ into the gap under her arm. Distancing herself with a careful burst from her Semblance, the girl fired a round off the hip, managing to hit her target dead on but only succeeding in shattering the image like glass.

' _Blake, watch out! That person is extremely dangerous!'_ Equally taken by surprise, the very thought of which frightened the former ninja. _'You need to help Ruby!'_

Before she could think, the Faunus complied. Before she could comply, the lumbering gunboat opened fire once again, tracers carving a brilliant swath between her and her captain. What remained of the iron flock returned, harrying the flighty cat with their own cannons. She quickly realized they were herding her away from the others- but with little she could do about it under the constant barrage.

"May I have this song?"

Even with fair warning, Weiss was taken aback by the speed and ferocity with which Roman forced himself upon her. Focused on the plight of her comrades, she hadn't honestly given the career criminal much thought, and that was a mistake.

"Apologies, I may not be such a worthy dance partner, your Highness." Speaking from the corner of his crooked smile while Weiss was huffing, trying to deflect his bludgeoning strikes. "My counterpart is admittedly much more graceful, but that's probably why she's fighting your leader and not me."

Roman was caught flat-footed quite literally when a pale glyph appeared underneath him.

"Ruby may be our leader," Not wasting the opportunity with words, Weiss was already springing into her lunge. "-But lowly men like you should learn not to underestimate any part of team RWBY!"

Feet locking in place, the smooth criminal was only able to defend with his weapon. Offense being the best defense, he met the girl's charge head-on with a rocket from the tip of his cane.

Merely cocking her head, Weiss let the flare fizzle by, uncaring as the acidic scent of phosphorus invaded her nose and the leaping sparks sizzled against her fair skin during her myopic charge. Roman grinned viciously even as he met her stab with an awkward parry.

This was because the shot was never intended for the heiress. Roman was a master of self-depreciation as a form of deception, it was how he was able to survive for so long in this chaotic life.

That, and his partner, Neo.

The mutely colorful woman probably didn't need his help with the Red Brat, but Roman wanted to get his own revenge in before she completely eviscerated Ruby.

Which would be any time now.

Neo was indeed a challenge, but Ruby had been pressing heavily against her unknown adversary, matching blow for blow since the surprise attack. What she could not compete against was the ferocity, the mad glee this girl appeared to derive from mortal combat. Each exchange a little death, a little bit of ecstasy.

' _Incoming.'_

" _Got it."_

Even while engaged in harrowing battle, Ruby had the wherewithal to notice Roman's stray shot careening towards her. Retreating slightly from her opponent, she swatted the incoming rocket off-course and into the ground between them.

Tired of the tri-colored girl's constant disappearing act, Ruby decided to pull one of her own and vanish in the ensuing explosion. Blake had dragged the Bullheads away, so the resultant dust cloud lingered, hiding her within it.

' _One o'clock. Three o'clock. Three-thirty… she's circling. Do you feel it?'_

" _Yes."_

Just like they'd trained, only with far more dire consequences than a simulated toad-tongue slapping her in the face.

' _Wait until the last possible moment, you want her to be the one to make the first mista-'_

Almost missing it during his speech, thankfully Ruby noted the subtle shift of light to her left before the multicolored banshee swept upon her. Practically flying along the ground and sneaking below her radar, Neo came in with a low strike aimed to fell her. With not much else to do, Ruby leapt over it, only to witness as the ghostly girl shattered before her very eyes.

Then came the stabbing shot to her back, hammering right above her kidney and sending her careening away. From tumbling on the ground, she tried to roll to her feet, but a wave of nausea made her unbalanced and she fell to a three-legged state propped up on _Crescent Rose_.

' _Sorry Ruby, there was no time to warn you.'_ Both combatants were silent as Ruby watched Neo look crookedly between her and her blade, trying to comprehend why the blow didn't penetrate. _'I forced some of my chakra to mix with your Aura so I could reinforce the point of impact.'_

Hence why she wouldn't be needing dialysis, and why she wasn't lying in a pool of her own blood. She was not worried about a little bit of queasiness if it meant her life was saved.

Unfortunately, Naruto **was** worried. He didn't even have a clear idea what he had done, nor what the prolonged consequences would be. Just being near Ruby seemed to be averse to her health in more than one way.

Without him, the match might have been fairly even between the two combatants. But there was a clear difference in the way they fought. The blow which he deflected away from her heart spoke volumes about this.

" _Here we go again."_

Shrugging off the oddity, Neo gestured 'come-hither' to the gasping girl. Fearless smile never once faltering from her coquettish face.

Clearly, Neo wasn't afraid of death- receiving it or causing it. Ruby lacked this commitment, and so Naruto feared that she would lose unless he intervened. Somehow.

One deep breath to center her mind and body, and Ruby was off again like a light. Throughout the constant barrage of strikes she rained down on Neo the girl was as cool as ice cream, contorting her body and dancing around the whistling blade.

But what could he do? His influence on the world of the living was limited to his words and a few party tricks. Could he convince Ruby that it had become a case of kill or be killed? Did he even dare to?

Ruby had an opportunity to make just such a fatal blow and deliberately slowed it, killing only her opportunity. One which Neo seized with a swift stomp of her stylish high-heels to Ruby's extended ankle- something snapped, and it wasn't the footwear.

' _Ruby!'_

Would they even get the chance to make that decision?


	9. Carboniferous: Pennsylvanian

**RE-UPDATED 12/05/18**

* * *

For Blake there was never any question. Having spent so much of her life on the outside looking in, she did not have to accept the pre-packaged morality.

-Or maybe that was just her excuse for not being stronger. Weaklings like her relied on necessity to justify their actions, not daring to think of the pain they were causing. Or else, shrouding it under the banner of 'righteousness'.

Regret would come later, as it always did.

Couldn't afford such frivolous things now- a bullet grazed her cheek, slapping her head away from Ruby and the pink menace. Dogging her for some time now, the gunships once again began belching rounds as the infantry moved away.

Summersaulting out of the line of fire and then underneath the wild swing of a wolverine Faunus as she ran. Quickly hooking the man- the boy's neck and just as quickly she hurled him over her hip, sending him crashing into three of his comrades and off the roof. She wouldn't stop to see if they landed safely and was already on her way again, outrunning a ribbon of lead.

There was no time to worry about any of them. She could only hope to save herself.

A grenade hurled form one of the open cargo doors erupted next to her, sending her sprawling towards another Bullhead waiting like a hungry vulture.

Not yet. Not done just yet.

Dragon's breath tore into her snarling face, scattering the shadows with their brilliant tracers. The real Blake was already back on her feet- heels planted on the glass viewscreen and staring in at the flabbergasted pilots.

Time enough to savor that little moment of pleasure before she jerked up on her ribbon, slipknot tightening around the cannon and dragging the clustered barrels. The visible path of rounds cut upwards- cut all but through the Bullhead opposite, sending the dying bird crashing down onto the roof.

In rage, the copilot drew his pistol and blasted indiscriminately through their windshield. Glass shards flew outwards, merged with the fragments of ice from the clone he hit.

Remnants of which fell as gentle flakes on Blake's shoulders like snow. She wanted to savor this victory but knew she couldn't. There was still so much left to do; two Bullheads remained aloft, and the one which had crashed only added to the number of foot soldiers she had to deal with.

Then there were her teammates. She was already regretting leaving them.

Multiple squads of soldiers remained in her way, the ones from the crash already shaking off their dizziness and taking a bead on her. They were set in their intentions while Blake wavered as if she were the one who was wounded.

She was. Lying to herself, bleeding emotions. Unable to become what was needed, never quite able to don that impassive mask over her heart. The only way she was going save herself, let alone her teammates- her friends- people who were totally innocent to this madness- was to let go of that last shred of decency she clung to.

It was a small price to pay.

"GET OUT OF MY WAY!"

Primal nature surging to the fore, for her as well as the lowly grunts who balked in the face of an apex predator. They should have left when they had the chance- they all should have.

Too late for any of them as she charged. Their bullets flew afield, and their swords trembled in their hands.

While some fled willingly in the face of the madwoman, others were forcibly shoved aside. It wasn't until Blake had halfway crossed that she realized the difference.

"You heard the woman!" Sun's roar sounding like a kitten's mewl in comparison to hers. "Move!"

Regardless, it got the job done. That, and his three-section staff which plowed its way through the ranks of White Fang who were quickly recognizing a battle on two fronts and rethinking their odds.

"You too, Blake!" Where she had been staring incredulously at the living knucklebone dancing on the battlefield, he called out to her. "Get going!"

Not comprehending at first, the person who should have been long gone at the first sign of SANFU was telling her to hightail it. Continuing to watch his desperate gymnastics, aimed not at protecting himself but a virtual stranger, at last she understood.

Not distracting him with anything more than a nod, she took off in the other direction. Not running away, but towards her friends.

"Finally." Sun snarked to himself, turning in time to clothesline two more Faunus fanatics. "Seriously though, what's with all these guys? Was there like a terrorist networking event in town or something?"

For all his bravado and pith, Sun knew that he had probably bitten off more than he could chew. His plan to make a commotion and then slip away in the confusion was proving more difficult than he had assumed, not the least because one of the gunships had decided that he was a riper target.

"Gonna have to deal with that sometime I guess- what the heck?!"

Stopping in the middle of a five-way smackdown probably wasn't the best idea, but considering the other four combatants also stopped to watch things unfold, Sun was probably not in danger.

Not from them, anyway.

Black on black, it appeared out of the night as a fever dream. Wings like moth-eaten sails flying high over its wormwood body, the still-beating hearts of brigands served as its eyes, commanding its voraciousness. No contention as to what it was, only _**why**_ it was- how something so vile could exist in the world.

"What's a Nevermore doing here?"

If such a thing could even be called this with its bald head looking more like a vulture and wings more like a bat. Indifferent to personal appearances, its claws were no less functional and opened the Bullhead up with the ease of a can-opener. Making little work of rest, its elongate beak sought the tasty insides, scooping up the fleshy morsels and tossing them down its throat with an easy jerk.

Student and terrorists alike watched as their fellow Faunus were swallowed whole, kicking and screaming the whole journey down the esophagus and dropping into the distended gullet whereupon they continued to writhe like indigestion.

Then the bird turned its sights on them.

That was probably when Sun should have severely regretted acting on his instincts and following the pretty girl into a very sketchy situation. But the truth was, Sun simply wasn't the kind of person to be bothered by such things.

Besides, as he readied himself for what was likely his blaze of glory with grim resignation, the buzzard decided he wasn't as appetizing as the meat-scraps that were desperately fleeing around him. Diving towards the White Fang, one beat of its leathery wings was all it took to propel its jerrymandered body and kick up a torrent that nearly blew Sun on his rear, otherwise leaving him alone.

"What is going on?"

* * *

"I bet you're wondering what's going on right about now."

Another such comment from the peanut gallery, from a location hidden among a labyrinth of crates.

"I'd actually be severely disappointed if you haven't already. From what I hear, you're supposed to be Beacon's top student."

All were intended simply to rile her up- and to her chagrin, they were working. Shots to her pride not nearly so grating as the fact that this unskilled, uncouth blackguard continued to evade her, slipping away every time she thought she had him pinned at the point of her rapier.

"Of course, that title doesn't actually mean much. Where have book smarts got you? Not even able to piece together what's happening around you… a Styrofoam cup is what you are. Plain, dull, ready and waiting to be filled, but just as easily replaced by something a lot more useful… like that Nikos girl."

The last exchange had sent them through a skylight and into one of the plethora of warehouses gridded up and down the dock. And from what she could tell, this had been Roman's plan all along, to slink away into a dark corner while his associate did all the heavy lifting.

"Such a sad existence, an empty vessel. Created just for one purpose, to be disposable. And then people like you have the bad habit of sticking around an eternity longer than anyone wants."

For all his 'trash talk', Roman did bring up one point of significance. Even if he was not the one pulling the strings, everything felt orchestrated, preordained. And it wasn't yet clear to what end, nor, to whose.

"They'll never give you what you want, you know. They'll keep plying you with tidbits like second-rate coffee, just enough to feed your addiction but never enough to sate it."

It was obvious what conclusions he wanted her to draw, the 'They' whom he was alluding to. Just as obvious was the fact that he was toying with her. Although, even then, it didn't necessarily mean that he was wrong…

' _Five paces ahead, on the right. Back corner.'_

"In the end, it's all a question of who you want to be used by-"

A monumental clap like an approving deity as two towering stacks of crates slammed together with the attraction of opposing glyphs, a jet of dust and dirt on either side being bellowed out along with a weathered Roman who narrowly escaped being crushed like a bug.

"If you want to talk, you should be doing it to the police as they're the only ones who care what you have to say." Weiss stated callously, sword drawn as she tentatively approached the downed criminal in case he had any further tricks up his sleeve.

"You-*cough*- really think the police are still-*hack*- coming?"

"I advise that you save your breath."

"*Caff*- Oh, don't worry, there's plenty more where that came from." Roman declared while trying and failing to brush down his coat which had taken on a permanent tinge of brown. "Me, I'll survive as I always have, just scraping by. I pity people like you… actually, pity is probably too strong a word. People like you… irritate the hell out of me!"

Blowing up the base of a nearby stack, wood fragments flying every which way as the tower toppled down between them. Heedlessly Weiss stepped forward, a glyph beneath her feet and halting the falling boxes mid-air.

"I really don't have time for trash like you." A flick of her wrist drew the glyph lopsided, sending the hovering crates flying at Roman who lithely scraped by in between. "I have to get back to my friends."

"We're all trash, doll. Human trash." With a leap away from the casually approaching girl, he fired a rocket into the ground beneath his feet to give him an extra boost on to the next stack. "The day they no longer need you, those supposed friends of yours will toss you away too. The only way to survive is to keep proving yourself useful. _Which is why I can't mess up this chance!"_

The only bit of honesty from his mouth was restrained to a harsh whisper which Weiss ignored in favor of regaining the high ground, dodging incendiary rounds and debris hurled her way.

"You're mistaken." Replying with her own whisper, cast over their interlocked weapons. Underestimating both her speed and her strength, with gritted teeth Roman wondered what else he could have gotten wrong. "It's I who pity you. Constantly mistrusting others, with no one you can trust to watch your back."

No opportunity for any witticisms as Roman was forcibly removed from the conversation, strung up by his ankles by a black ribbon looped over one of the ceiling girders. Quick on the uptake, Weiss disarmed the inverted man with but a prick on his wrist, letting _Melodious Cudgel_ fall into the waiting hands of her comrade.

"Finally. What took you so long?" Playing off her fatigue with a huff, Weiss crossed her arms and leaned heavily on her back leg, shooting a mock-glare at Blake.

"I should be asking you the same thing. Someone like Roman really gave you that much trouble?"

"I'm still here, you know?" The man grumbled, doing all he could simply to hang on to his bowler.

"Don't remind us. You have anything we can use as a gag, Blake?"

"You're asking me because…?" The first real look exchanged between them, conveying mischief, humor, but also meanness, suspicion, vulnerability, and optimistic expectations. "Right. We won't go there."

Smiling, hesitantly, but it was a start. A new one.

"Rather than worry about this loser though, we should get back to Ruby." Blake's suggestion something they could unite behind.

"Right." Remembered urgency hardening momentarily softened features. "But how do we get up there?"

Despite half the warehouse's volume being occupied by boxed goods, there was still a substantial gap between them and the skylight which both had presumably entered through.

Something tickled their brains in the darkness, scurrying, scratching, which raised their hackles at the same time a black mass rose up to the ceiling. Pitched at such an angle that they could easily walk up, and solid enough despite its gentle undulations in an unseen breeze.

"Nu-uh." Weiss shook her head at the newly revealed path forward. "Nope. No way. There's got to be a ladder or something around here. Anything but _that._ "

"They're just cockroaches." Blake told herself this with a shudder, already forcing the first foot forward. "We don't have time to be picky."

"…Fine."

"Oi! Aren't you two forgetting something?"

Fixing him with a gaze more disparaging than what was reserved for the insects, Blake's sudden shift to a smirk wasn't reassuring to the hamstrung criminal.

"Shi-"

"Night-night."

Blackness took him.

* * *

Black spots twinkled in and out of her vision as she bit down on the pain like a month-old brownie.

…Not that she knew what that was like, anyhow. Sugary treats never surviving that long in the Rose-Xiao-Long household. What she did know was the discomfort of a sprained ankle, doing so more than once when learning how to use her semblance. Her uncle had insisted she learn how to work through the minor injury with the claim that 'it built character.'

He had been right, in a way.

A broken ankle was a totally different matter, but the principle was the same. She could still reinforce the affected joint with Aura, thus preventing the shattered bones from jabbing through her skin. -That was the idea, anyway. Much harder in practice when she couldn't get a moment's reprieve and was forced to put stress on it or risk other body parts getting injured.

Keeping it up took a lot of concentration- more so than she could spare while fighting the deadly wind-up doll known as Neapolitan, and so every step ground fractured surfaces together, forcing screaming agony up her femur. Naruto's Chakra was probably better up to the task, but with the near-delirium caused from the pain, she wasn't sure she could handle further distraction.

Actually, she was probably not qualified to make that decision. Nauseous pain was overcoming most of her extraneous thoughts not related to the next step, the next strike, the next hastily mounted block-

Muscles clenched in distress as she was forced on her back foot, blood throbbing up and down her left leg that it might burst. She used that pain, exploded outwards against their interlocked blades and forced Neo to take a step back- another with a follow-up swing which slid her hands to the base of the haft.

But no more than that, instincts and muscles telling her to disengage. Lungs screaming at her in protest, stomach on strike after being ignored for hours on end. Only her heart was pulling a double shift, pounding, trying to break out of her chest and slap her in the face for being such a dummy.

Her body was falling apart all at once, just like her team.

Somehow, that thought was more painful than her leg, dulling the throb but doing nothing for murkiness clouding her vision like overexposed film.

' _Focus Ruby!'_

A rouge wave hit her swimming vision, nearly knocking her off her feet but also banishing some of the encroaching fog.

" _What did you just do?"_

' _Hell if I know, ask Shikamaru when you're not fighting for your life!'_

" _Right!"_

Gaining a second wind just in time to avoid being skewered, Ruby levered _Crescent Rose_ to vault her body over Neo's charge. The heel of her uninjured leg was to come down hard on top of that pink head, but Neo dropped to the ground, sweeping the planted scythe with her. Not fighting momentum, Ruby carried her weapon around in a wide arc which scraped a deep gouge in the roof before earning a shallow nick on Neo's chin.

Unable to relish this trivial accomplishment though, for as soon as her feet hit the ground a starburst of pain almost knocked her on her back. Vile burgundy like dried blood flashed across her eyes and when it passed Neo was nowhere to be found.

A metronome tapping a sultry rhythm at her back made her turn, finding Neo walking a slow track past the remnants of their battlefield. Waltzing by upturned tiles like fish scales, pipes jutting through the black tarpaper like the bones in her ankles begged to do. The villainous woman herself no worse for the wear, proudly wearing that crimson sliver on her face and drawing a slender finger over it, dipping into her pursed lips slowly and longingly...

Twitching, Ruby _wished_ for the selective blindness because she was otherwise unable to take her eyes off the deadly woman.

' _Focus, Ruby.'_

This time hist voice was not accompanied by the tidal wave to her psyche, instead by a weary sigh which floated an odd sense of déjà-vu on top of it all.

" _R-Right."_

' _Oh, and the real one is above you.'_

Ringing like a right answer on a gameshow, she blocked the diminutive swordswoman's strike, relishing the frustrated frown which looked almost like a pout.

-Not for long though, as Neo kicked off her blade, ricocheted against the ground and flew as a dart targeting her lame leg.

A burst of her semblance whisked her from harm's way, and an opposite burst from her rifle brought her flying back into the fray. With her debilitating injury, she had been relying heavily upon _Crescent Rose's_ momentum for the second half of this fight, using ammunition judiciously just to keep up wither her opponent.

It was clear she would be unable to do this for long. The lightness in her pouches matched only by the lightness in her head.

Pouring herself behind her blade, Ruby crashed into Neo and sent both skidding. Relentlessly keeping up the attack, there was no reason to retreat so long as she was within range. Her mobility- her greatest asset was severely limited, and made every pass a gamble.

Not that staying up close and personal with the deadly assassin was much safer, but with her longer blade she could maintain the distance she wished. Forgetting the discomfort- forgetting to think, to breath as she swung death's blade against a straw-thin defense.

If she couldn't rest, neither would her opponent. Lording her last advantage over the equally petite girl, that extra hand and a half of steel alloy rattling bones like the glass in window frames with every blow. All she needed was for one of her strikes to land- and Neo knew it too, if the furrowed look on her face was indicative. One good hit, just one of her swings to slip in under that guard, just one-

Miss.

That was all it took to turn the tide of the battle once again against her. Overextending that bisecting swing as the other girl took a half-step back to let the metal pass by her waspish waist.

She couldn't catch herself- though she tried, and that proved to be the bigger mistake. Magmatic anguish bubbled up from her ankle hot and furious. The only thing keeping her limb vaguely leg-shaped at that point was her sturdy lineman's boots. There wasn't enough rigidity to keep her upright though, and she tumbled, sprawling ignominiously in front of her adversary.

Lying on her back, she might have noticed that the stars had finally made their debut. But this consolation took a back seat compared to the shimmering blade which descended from the heavens. Rolling away, she groped blindly for _Crescent Rose_ but had no time to search for it as she was chased by that deadly needle.

Skipping after, Neo hunted her crimson target like a cat does a red laser pointer, periodically pouncing on her prey and silently preening when Ruby barely managed to avoid being nailed to the roof. It was all a game at this point, savoring every moment the girl made her sweat the previous contest.

This fact was clear even from Ruby's vantage, the knowledge that the play could end at any moment- the fact that _she_ could be ended at any moment the older girl wished did not escape her notice. But she shoved it down at the bottom of the list along with the humiliation of scrambling around on hands and knees, dirty, exhausted and desperate in that darkest hour.

Blind at the bottom of that deep, dark well, looking for a way, something to help her claw a way out-

Solid in her hand like a rock but light as her spirit, she found her scythe with her hand, gripped it and spun around, swinging it with all her might-

And watching it sail away, hearing it clatter and scrape on tiles, skid off the roof where it fell for an eternity before it hit rock bottom.

The pain didn't register, not at first, not above everything else. First came the warmness, wet blood invading an already soaked sleeve and dripping down past the crook of her elbow.

Then the hopelessness sunk in.

Dropping on its own into her lap, she cradled her arm with the delicacy of a wounded bird- the same way Penny did. The object in question equally foreign, her hand almost detached as the cut made it halfway through her wrist before stopping.

But Neo wasn't. She was still stalking towards her, deliberately, menacingly, needle tip of her blade scraping Ruby's blood off against the ground.

One hand and foot each working hard to scuttle backwards as far and as fast as she could- which wasn't all that much before her back pressed against the ridges of a ventilator. There hadn't been much point after all, Neo was sure to follow her wherever she ran, tracking that broad trail of blood which now recorded her killer's footprints.

Was all that hers? There was so much of it, and it was dark, like good chocolate. When all that had been bled out of her, what would be left? All the cookies she consumed stripped away as flesh from her bones, her life's work cast overboard, friends, family, nowhere to be found…

Something was yelling at her, screaming. Oh, was that Naruto? Had he been talking to her this whole time? Not much could get past the pulsing throb of her heart, of the footsteps continuing to approach her.

Pristine white shoes gazed up at her from that darkly reflective surface. A blade followed, caressing her chin and lifting her head so that she could see the mirrored mark under Neo's pencil-thin smirk. Then it dove back down, slowly, tracing a line down her throat, down her chest, into her shirt…

Coming back up with a silver chain looped around, candy-orange crystal dangling so close like the harvest moon.

"No…"

In her sick headiness, not pleading, stating, as she reached up with the only arm which would obey and limply shoved the blade aside, fumbling her fingers around the gemstone.

' _What are you doing Ruby?! Just let her have me, that's all she wants and then she'll leave you alone!'_

"Can't… do that."

' _Can't? I_ _ **can't**_ _heal you. I_ _ **can't**_ _protect you. I_ _ **can't**_ _even lie to you and tell you that everything is going to be alright, because right now you are losing a_ _ **lot**_ _of blood and unless a miracle happens, you_ _ **will die**_ _.'_

"Do all your stories… have to be sad?" Grudging, clinging hard, painfully, while everything else went numb.

" _I don't want this one to be, so please, Ruby, I'm begging you, let me go."_

Neo's blade saying the same thing, resting atop her thumb and glaring back at her. Once again, forcing her chin up so that they could meet eye to eye. Whatever pity or even defiance she wished to convey was lost as Neo stared at her through rose-colored irises.

 _What's the matter, don't you believe in miracles?_

Rolling gaily pink eyes, Neo slapped her hand with the flat of the blade, pinching a nerve and forcing her fingers to part.

 _No. Not anymore._

Sudden and overwhelming like a flashbang grenade, a wave of light blew Neo back and sent her tripping over her own feet. When at last she dared open them again, her eyes had been bled of their color as had her face.

All that crimson flowed over to the other girl, her red cloak morphing to an iron-stained pelt. The silvery necklace had become glittering fangs which hung off a vulpine and predatory face. Where there had been but one, now nine scythes swished as crooked tails looming high and anticipating a command from the Grim Reaper. Hellish flames set the tone with their mocking cackle, but Neo was held captive in silence by those eyes which held the frozen Loch.

Mouth working uselessly as she scooted back on her rear, the demon spoke for her.

" _ **So, you enjoy causing pain to others? Tell me, puny human, what do you think gives you the right?"**_

Where Roman's partner had been content to remain silent throughout the whole ordeal, now her face contorted hideously trying to form any kind of response to satiate the beast.

" _ **In what way are you superior to all the other meat-bags? Do you think you are stronger? Smarter? That you know a horrible truth about the world which grants you clemency to act like a monster?"**_

Neo searched the ground for her sword with trembling hands but didn't dare look away from the foxlike creature. Each passing moment under its hot breath and cold stare made her hunt more desperate. But even if it should have been right next to her, the parasol blade was nowhere to be found.

Knowing what she was about, the beast sought to recapture her attention. Before she knew it, her hands were moved in front of her in a useless gesture to halt the snapping jaws which piddled droplets of saliva on her face and arms.

" _ **Fool! Everyone feels pain! Everyone knows that life is unfair! Everyone has a monster deep down inside of them, but it is the strong who choose never to let it out!"**_

And if he could break free, he might just have torn that waif apart limb from limb for the pain she caused Ruby. Because she was the exception to the rule, whatever beast she had locked up at one time had since been transmuted by her kindness into a harmless puppy. She didn't deserve such vileness, she didn't deserve a monster like him.

The other one… she didn't deserve this, either. No, she deserved far more than what fear he could instill with a mere illusion. Still, it was poetic justice that Neo should prove especially susceptible to such mental manipulations, not least considering he used to suck at Genjutsu. Divine irony, or perhaps his Devil's luck returning at long last.

" _ **So, how 'bout it girl? You want to test yourself against a**_ _ **real**_ _ **monster?"**_

Strawberry and chocolate swirled as Neo shook her head violently back and forth, ignoring the strands which whipped at her ashen cheeks.

" _ **I'm sorry, I don't understand. You're going to have to speak up!"**_

A whisper scratched at her throat, brought ancient tears forth. Extracted a pang of compassion from Naruto as that pitiful noise rang clear over a night now oddly devoid of noise. Crackling flames having died out on their own, and menacing aircraft migrated off somewhere unknown…

" _ **What was that?"**_

Confusion blurred through her melting eyes as the monster did not seem to be talking to her. She had said nothing and heard nothing beyond the raucous rancor of this beast.

But Naruto did, only recognizing it when the claws were already around his throat.

" _ **Kuso-!"**_

Illusory monster violently dispelled and replaced by a very real one, the malformed Nevermore squawked indignantly at its missed meal. Heavy wings beat up a tizzy as it tried to extract its talons from their asphalt sheath, violent wind blowing away Neo's tears and hallucinations.

She blinked in surprise and confusion, but not so much fear as her mind began working straight again and her hand clenched around the sword which had been in her grasp the whole time. Even as the Grimm turned to inspect her prone form, she felt only contempt for it as well as herself for falling for such a paltry trick.

Finding Neo in many ways unappealing, it turned back to its first target with an avarice-filled gaze. The orange crystal hung there like a ripe fruit on the girl whose blood was but a tempting aperitif. Lead by its crooked beak, it lumbered towards them.

Silently, impotently, he raged. Beat against his prison walls with imaginary fists, flailed phantom limbs every which way, trying to do something- anything other than just sit there uselessly while another one of his friends was swallowed by the darkness. _Somehow_ he had protected her before, _somehow_ he had managed to project his personal demon unto Neo. Why couldn't he revive those efforts, focus them into a spear to either break his prison or penetrate that flea-bitten gander?

Both of these things were impossible, but he hadn't given up hope yet. This was the absolute _least_ he could do for the girl unconsciously clutching him in paling fingers.

Up to the last possible moment he would try an infinity of impossibilities, pushing himself to an exhaustion he could scarcely remember before this crystalline body. What good was energy if it wasn't used? Cast as viscous arcs of ionized light which leapt off him unconsciously.

They did little to deter the curious bird however, instead attracting it like a moth to a bug-zapper. Heedless of the gale wind rending at necrotized flesh, the creature waddled closer with beak cracked dumbly. How Naruto wished he could just have one last punch to that offensive visage. One good slug-

Flames swallowed the wind and lit up the night, slammed into that grim beast with the inevitability of a meteor. A blow that eclipsed anything from his memory, snap of the neck a more satisfying a sound than those three little words he always longed to hear.

"I'll kill you."

Garbled screeches directed 90˚ to the speaker, living carrion trying to right itself from the vicious right hook.

"No one hurts my sister and gets away with it!"

A living explosion, Yang poured herself into each strike in that endless recitation. Fearsome though it was on its own, on the receiving end of her vengeance the Grimm might as well have been a pressed duck, trussed up and served well-done.

That's the way it seemed at first, hindsight remembering that golden hue more than the darkness.

Appearing from that blackness so unexpectedly, Yang did get a few nice shots in here and there, but in the end, it was but beating a dead horse- or bird, rather. Bones snapped that weren't there, organs battered which were just for show. The only real thing about the monster was the meal it swallowed and then regurgitated on her, partly-digested.

"EEW! Seriously?! I thought we went through this once already with Jaune?!" Halted in her assault by chunks of flesh and stomach acid spewed on her after a particularly attuned punch.

Not knowing a Jaune, not knowing who this irritating intruder was- not knowing anything but that prime directive which stirred its fleshy mechanics and launched its guillotine beak at Yang in her moment of distraction.

Another fist, this one made of ice, uppercut the creature before it could reach Yang and snapped its jaw shut.

"Yang! What are you doing here?"

Not making the same mistake, the blonde devoted only a corner of her eye for a glare at the white-haired girl jogging over to her.

"I should be the one asking _**you**_." Trundling to a stop as she was hit with the accusation, Weiss tried to find her misplaced retort when the Nevermore beat her to it with an indignant squawk. "First and foremost, though, what we _**should**_ be doing is taking care of Roadkill here."

"Right." Both shifted into combative stances unconsciously compensating for the other. "So what's the plan?"

"How the hell should I know? I just got here. Besides, that's more of Ruby's-" Remembering her original purpose, Yang whipped around to where her sister was slumped over in a dark puddle. "Ruby!"

"Yang!"

Imitating thought, the beast charged as soon as it recognized the opportunity. It only made it a few lumbering steps before slipping on a patch of ice which materialized in its way, skidding to a messy halt where both Weiss and Yang had time to move themselves out of its path. Flanking either side, they exchanged shots which whipped its elongate head back and forth but did not deter it from its original target.

"It's ignoring us!" Weiss screamed above the racket, changing tactics as the beast made another lunge for their unmoving captain.

"Let's see you ignore this!"

Throwing herself at the bird, it only recognized the blonde missile after she had made impact. The resultant chain of explosions knocked it free of Weiss's restraining glyph.

Touching down at same time as her target, Yang was back on the run the very next moment seeing that the beast still stirred. Passing straight by her white-haired teammate on the way, she was oblivious to the warnings shouted at her in leu of the screaming rage in her heart.

Aiming for that jumbled mass of feathers and flesh, she cocked an arm back that was loaded with 12 gauge of fire Dust. As before it did not heed her approach, but with a careless shrug of its wings it batted her away.

Flames extinguished halfway through her flight, she smashed into a maintenance shack and nearly knocked it off its moorings. Peeling away from the Yang-shaped dent, she tried to catch herself but tumbled on knees that wouldn't support her weight.

Another screech, neither satisfied nor sardonic, still just _hungry_.

"Over here!" Surprisingly, it listened, along with anyone conscious enough to do so. "I got a nice, juicy carrot-top for you."

Turning around, Blake showed off her captive, hamstrung over her shoulder with a net of shadows. Hoping that the shock of orange hair would be akin to a matador's cape for this single-minded creature.

"Blake! It's not going to work!" Split between her allies, Weiss shouted this advisement across the roof. "For some reason this thing only seems to want to go for Ruby! Just drop Torchwick and give us a hand to stop it!"

Shaking off its temporary daze, the Nevermore looked to be contemplating whether or not this was true as it shifted its pupil-less red eyes back and forth between them.

Reading the beast's body language, Blake was already preparing to make a run for it with a snarky remark held in reserve for the know-it-all Schnee. But even as she was about to drop her burden, her attention was split by a strike that would have done the same to her head. Instead, the blade shaved a few hairs from her feline features.

Torchwick's unconscious body went one way as she bounded to the other, _Gambol Shroud_ already raised and drawing a bead on her would-be assassin. With her keen Faunus eyes, there would be no mistaking- and no missing, the colorful Neapolitan.

A whistling drew her attention back to the Grimm as it let loose a salvo of feathers like ballistae at her. Forcing to move now or never again, she sacrificed an earthen copy of herself to gain altitude by leaping off its back. From there, another shadow clone served as a launchpad to hurl herself towards her comrades.

Seeing the misshaped crow turn its back on them, Neo breathed a sigh of relief. She sheathed her sword and dropped to her knees, cradling her unconscious partner. It must have been a funny sight with the small girl clutching on to his limp form like an overgrown teddy bear, but the picture was gone soon enough. They vanished from that world made of glass, having thrown the first stone.

"What are you doing?! Don't lead it over here!"

Having narrowly survived becoming catmeat, Blake looked askance at the less-than-welcome.

"Would you prefer it to go after Ruby?" Not needing to look, but finding it difficult to resist, Weiss bit her lips to keep her head straight. "Alright then, so it'd be in your best interest to keep _**me**_ alive."

Even with ample motivation, they knew it was going to be a hard task.

Harder still for Yang seemed to be telling up from down. But with the same driving force, she put aside that distinction in favor of simply crawling forward. While her Semblance allowed her to rebound nigh-instantaneously and twice as hard, the goal she had in mind was too delicate for her normal blunt methods.

"Hey, Ruby, are you okay?" Rising to her feet only to trip towards the unnaturally still bundle of wool, Yang slid in next to her sister with a gentle hand shaking her shoulder. "C'mon, speak to me. Are you awake?"

Lolling her head to the side in an obvious 'no', the blonde followed her shut gaze to the shallow lake she was kneeling in.

"Oh, no- no, no, no, no…"

Reality hit her harder than any strike. Shaky hands went through the familiar motions of retrieving the medical supplies at the same time her wide lilac eyes scoured the darkness for the source of all the fluid. Moving aside the ruined cloak, she was instantly able to spot the grievous injury by the dried blood like a tribal bracelet around Ruby's wrist.

In her all-but-futile efforts to scrub it clean with a single disinfecting wipe, she never noticed the clot made of crystalline amber spanning the cut and holding both halves together. And she never would, the material dissolving as sugar in the bloodstream after the bandages had been wrapped tight over the surface.

"Hey now, that's better, right?" Pressing down hard on the fix, trying to find that reset button which would awaken her sister. "Come on now Ruby, we have to clean up your mess."

As much as she would like to continue the charade of normalcy, Yang's ingrained training knew that there were things she needed to do. Against mental protests, she checked the intact wrist for a pulse. Nothing. Jugular, still coming up empty. Frantic by this point, desperate for her own comfort, she pressed her ear against her sister's modest chest, ignoring the sharp jab of the necklace pressing into the back of her head.

Faint, all but a whisper. Through strata of cloth and flesh and eons of time it came up, low and slow, but earth-moving. Yang sighed and all but collapsed against the unconscious girl.

'… _Thank you…'_

A pulse, a whisper.

She sat up and looked to see if her sister would do the same. But the words were not precursor to awareness. Drawing a harrowed breath and trying to ignore the acidic stench of blood and bile, Yang drew a filthy hand through her flawless hair, grimacing as she realized what she had done.

Easily ignored when an explosion at her back rained black chips over both siblings. Protecting her sister instinctively, Yang twisted to glare at the living carrion which continued to resist all that her comrades were throwing at it. Considering she herself had hit it with a goodly portion of her augmented strength, it was unsurprising, though a little disheartening to see it still ambling about.

"What's it going to take to bring that fucker down?"

Out of habit she clamped a hand over her mouth and turned towards her unconscious sister, expecting, and for once disappointed that she didn't hear Ruby chiding her for the 'dirty' words.

She did, however, notice the necklace which had become a common accessory in her sister's wardrobe, untypically hanging loose outside her shirt and unusually dull in its luster. Something about this struck her as drastically wrong. She was drawn to the inanimate thing, only afterwards realizing this wasn't quite true.

'… _You can hear me, can't you?'_

Tempted to rip her hand back in surprise, instead Yang found her fingers already firmly stuck to the molten gem.

' _What I want you to do now, is listen…'_

A violent crash shook the building, the whole structure threatening to collapse as the Nevermore wrenched and gyred, trying to free itself from the tiger-trap formed by the broken skylight and iron girders. The whole building straining to hold everything together.

"Hit it now!" Blake shouted over her own strain keeping the shadowy binds strung over it.

"With what?!" Exasperated and exhausted, Weiss shouted back over the commotion.

"Everything!"

So she did, everything that was left after almost a full hour of prolonged combat, anyway. Several decades' worth of seasons were brought to Vale in the span of mere seconds, battering the unfortunate Grimm and weathering the building at an accelerated rate. Between the man-made structure and the nature-made beast, the victor was obvious.

"…And, what now?" Weiss asked, devoid of sarcasm.

Wrung out and mutilated- but free, the putrefying thing scrambled out of the newly expanded hole which had caved half the roof in. Half-devoured chicken wings scratched and scraped against the bare metal to drag its disintegrating body towards the expectant huntresses.

"We could run." Discarding the impractical feeling of cowardice, Blake made this suggestion. "Where did Yang go? Did she already get Ruby?"

"I don't know, maybe she-" Turning to the last known location of their comrades, only to have a blazing yellow blur shoot past them. "-Dang it, Yang! Not this again!"

"Hold up." Sharp amber eyes spotted their counterpart, an orange satsuma glowing within the boxer's fist as she passed.

 _I couldn't protect her._

Each of her powerful footsteps obliterated part of the roof underneath them, but something kept her floating above falling, a warm wind under her wings.

 _It seems that the only purpose we ghosts serve is revenge._

Yang wasn't questioning it. That decision was probably not the most logical, but she trusted her instincts over her brain, and it was them which brought her out here in the first place.

 _So please, for me, for her…_

Besides, this was something she intended to do, regardless. What was so bad about a little boost to her confidence, another reason to hope that everything would turn out alright?

… _Fuck this bastard up!_

"Don't have to tell me twice…"

But the noise was already so oppressive she couldn't hear herself think. The tangerine in her grip having redoubled in size and ferocity, spinning so rapidly within a self-contained shell of wind-Dust that she was almost positive any moment now it would burst and take her hand with it. -Deathly sure that without her gauntlet _Ember Celica_ her fingers would have already torn themselves free to fly away with the shrieking cacophony.

\- Which was a shame, because she really wanted to hear this thing wail when she hit it. Wanted to feel the charcoal flesh torn away under her fingers and the last pulse of life fade from the world.

Oh well, she'd have to settle for-

' _Rasengan!'_

Already rotten flesh peeled away from under her hand, consumed by a whirlwind which stretched out double the diameter of her gauntlets and atomized everything it came into contact with. Further, deeper, she was the driving force and served this role with gusto, not stopping even when the sphere wavered, flickered and finally died.

Light burning out, she found herself in almost utter darkness, cool and sticky. There were other sensations too, ones she tried not to think about that were associated with her being neck-deep in the beast's belly. She pushed past them, shoved through snags which might have been ribs, fingers, teeth- faces which might have been staring at her if only there was more light than that pinprick at the far wall.

"Choke on this, ya bastard-"

Lunging towards that glow, she grabbed it and wrenched it free-

Night crumbled around her, darkness pierced by arrows of silver light. Shredding and tearing, that which was not drilled into the ground dissolved into the ether, wafting past the baby fragments of the moon which were peaking around the clouds to see if it was alright to come out. What remained was-

"Yang!"

Covered in the remnants of gore which did not sublimate, she sat upright on the canted roof and blinked owlishly, comprehending that it was still in fact nighttime.

"Are you alright?"

The two pulled their teammate away from the perilous abyss, belaying their way back to solid ground using Blake's nigh-indestructible ribbon.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Checking herself after this was said, Ruby's necklace winking at her from the chain on her wrist. There was something else, though. Something digging into her hand besides her clenched finger nails. "What's this…?"

Heliodor yellow and no larger than a pea, it fit securely in her palm and did not roll out because of an irregular and conchoidal fracture which ran along one whole side. Clear even to a novice eye that it was but a fragment of its former self.

"Huh, that's actually kind of pretty."

' _You're not so bad yourself. Just remember that none of it lasts.'_

Then, as if the mere act of gazing upon it were enough, it began to crumble.

"Hey, wait-"

' _Thanks for freeing me, that was cool of you.'_

The period at the end of the sentence became just another grain, another speck of Dust that she tried to hang on to but which was lost on a seaward breeze as the sun rose and began to stir life anew.

"What… was that?" Breathless, Yang stared out to where the golden cloud had drifted over the horizon.

"That's…" Weary in so many ways, Weiss knew they all wanted answers, but also knew they could wait. "…It's a long story."

"And an old one."

And plain to see that it wasn't going anywhere.

"Fine." Confused, perturbed, but more than any of that, worried, Yang unconsciously gripped the elongate crystal in her possession in leu of its owner. "You can tell me all about it after we get Ruby to the hospital."

"Is she going to be alright?" Having waited the whole evening, guilt and regret were marching back and beating drums in Blake's chest.

"Ms. Rose is going to be just fine."

Weary though they all were, each intuitively fell back on their training, ready to smash their way through anyone that stood between them and their captain.

-Except, of course, their school's headmaster.

"P-professor Ozpin!"

They all stowed their weapons at the same time he waved them off, dismissing their worries as well as their chagrin. The smile he continued to wear stubbornly was no larger or smaller than ever, but it still visibly taxed the aging professor.

"Ms. Rose is currently with the emergency medical response unit. She lost a lot of blood, but the hemorrhaging has stopped, and she has been given a transfusion to speed up recovery."

"A transfusion? By whom?" Yang asked, curious as to whom else besides her would donate such a valuable commodity.

"Fortunately, your uncle happened to be in town this evening on a mission and was nearby when I was alerted." Something about this wore so heavily on Ozpin that it caused him to drop his smile. "It was bad luck that we were on the other side of the city and that the information took so long to reach me. By the time anyone knew the size of the operation, things had already escalated far beyond your capabilities."

Clutching his cane while recounting this, at some point the short debriefing became too much for him to even keep his head up and the distinguished man all but bowed.

"I must apologize for letting things get so out of hand. You are all my students, and it is supposed to be my job to protect you. But I failed. I am sorry."

The entire evening had been nothing short of an indigestion-induced-nightmare. This was the point in the dream where things were supposed to get better, but it was all still tainted with a lingering disquiet so that even the ordinary seemed sinister.

But this was still far from normal; the most powerful and influential man in Vale- possibly the whole world was genuflecting to a bunch of yearling students. In fact, it was so incredible and so arresting that one almost didn't make it to the final station, almost missing the conductor's voice screaming at them.

"You… knew."

She _should_ have known. Every time Weiss felt that she had arrived, as if she had woken up from the dream to find the real-reality, a unicorn came prancing through or some ninja walked by on the ceiling to break her of this. Being wrong never got any easier, but it did help what came next.

"That's why the police didn't come. You expected us to come out here." Not a question, but still hoping them to be lies. Sickness growing the less it was denied. "Why?"

"Because I was once part of the White Fang."

Plowing through Shikamaru's labored groan, Blake stepped to the fore. She drew attention away from the haunted man and towards the fact that her omnipresent bow was no longer in place, something which only now found importance.

"Wait-wait-wait! Just slow down a minute, all this is just crazy." Even though they could see it with their very human eyes, some could not keep up with this full disclosure. "White Fang, Roman Torchwick, Zombie-Grimm, Uncle Qrow- can someone just please tell me _simply_ what's going on here?"

Even the crickets dare not answer.

"I am to understand that you haven't informed your teammate yet?"

No one had volunteered, so it fell to the responsible adult who gained courage from a long drink of air. The smile which Ozpin revived was bitter and not at all amused with the way things were turning out. Neither were the looks of guilt which were being passed around like bathroom cigarettes.

"Suffice to say that there is no short answer, Ms. Xiao-Long, though you will come to understand this, shortly.

"What must be addressed is the current problem of Roman Torchwick enlisting the strength of the White Fang for his heists. As an individual he was dangerous but ultimately unimportant, choosing to hit soft targets with his personal survival taking precedence. This incident marks not only a change in targets but a change in attitude. However, his heavy-handed tactics are not nearly so concerning to me as his brazenness in singling out you three- or, rather I should say, the three 'Complete' Dust crystals in your possession."

"Will you at least tell me what you mean by 'Complete' Dust?" Yang asked morosely, wallowing too much in her ignorance to notice the flinch shared by her teammates.

"Complete. Enlightened. Internally-Autochthonous. Sentient." Indulging in but a small bit of amusement for the otherwise dour subject, Ozpin pointed at the necklace with his cane and awaited the deliverance. "Such as the one you have in your hand."

Feeling very much like she was being put over and blocked out, Yang glared at the orange trinket with frustrated skepticism-

' _Yo.'_

-And nearly dropped it, her knees following after as she bore down on the crystal with wide eyes that showed none of their previous fatigue.

"You mean- that was- it was- I wasn't just hallucinating?!"

' _Nope.'_ The reply came with a distinctly popped 'p' which rattled around in her brain.

"No."

"Not this time."

"Sadly, no."

' _I'm the one that should be complaining, troublesome woman. You just had to go and blab, we could have worked this out at a sedate place in a nice, controlled setting. But noooo….'_

This continued, but Blake ignored it like they ignored Yang in favor of the other glaring issues.

"Why?" This one still standing obstinate, along with its owner who was finally willing to forego the established path and trudge to the destination on her own. "Why do they want them? Why did this happen? Why did you set us up? Why **us**?"

A series of questions, any of which might have led him down a dark road. And so, Ozpin regarded Weiss while reflecting on the straightest path to the truth.

"It should be obvious by now what kind of power and responsibility you now hold in your hands, even if you have only born witness to a fraction of what they are capable of. Should one treat them not as beings but as expendable resources… I do not know what our enemies are planning to do with them. That was one reason for this act, so that we might suss out the truth."

"This isn't a play." Yang was on her feet again and ignoring for the moment the intelligent life she clutched in her hand. "Not when our lives are at stake."

"No, you are right. I am sorry." Less disarming now, yet still managing to strike them with that bowed head- or perhaps the heavy tone like lead. "I cannot ask for forgiveness. I do not deserve it. I have made so many mistakes, and yet I will continue to make them for as long as I live. Such is the nature of being. I have often wondered though, at what point do so many errors constitute a failure? If a life is consumed by atonement, is any of the progress it makes meaningful?

"I wanted to give you all the chance to find all this out on your own. To make mistakes and grow from them, perhaps find answers to some of these difficult questions. As an educator though, it was my job to see that you didn't take any unnecessary risks, to make sure that you didn't fall into this conundrum which should only plague the ancient. I failed in that duty."

"So, you knew the whole time? About them, about me, the White Fang?" Both relieving and constraining in the same breath, Blake felt the emptiness of this zero-sum game the headmaster was lamenting. "Knowing everything, you thought we could handle it on our own. What changed?"

"We had no idea the extents to which they were prepared to go, nor indeed what their true targets were." Ozpin revealed. "Intelligence suggested a quick raid, two Bullhead cargo ships maximum. Due to… lack of communication, I was unaware that Atlas had 'misplaced' four of their transport gunships. And because of persistent cloud cover, this oversight was not revealed until other alarms had been raised."

Anticipating the next question provided Ozpin the opportunity for a small smile once again.

"All due credit for this belongs to your new friend, a Mr. Wukong, I believe? That boy is quite the runner, and whatever he said to the authorities managed to convince them to forego my orders. I guess it goes to show that even if we can't predict everything, sometimes it turns out for the best."

For the first time that night, regret was truly stymied and not postponed, and Blake joined the man in an expression of satisfaction.

"I guess we should thank him then."

Ozpin nodded in agreement.

"So long as we don't get into too many specifics. He is unaware of anything beyond your former affiliation with the White Fang, correct?"

In comparison Blake's nod was hesitant, the nightmare not long forgotten and its sickening unease rising in her throat.

"Good. That makes things easier. I'm sure you'll agree that the fewer people who know about this matter, the better. Ms. Goodwitch has been harping me on this for some time, and I agree that I have been far too lax with things. It's high time I was more proactive in my role."

"Proactive…sir?" Gravitating towards her comrades, Weiss felt the same apprehension gaining mass inside of her.

"Indeed. Henceforth, you needn't worry about any of this. I will be taking responsibility of them from now on."

 _~We woke up_

 _Yeah, we woke up_

 _And we won't fall back to sleep!~_


	10. Paleozoic: Permian

**IMPORTANT:**

 **Right, so here it is: I majorly fucked up. Not much else to say besides that. Maybe there is, but no one wants to hear it. What you do need to know is that I have scrapped the preceding chapter and made some MAJOR changes to this one. Changes which will actually further the story and not linger in psychological BS for longer than necessary (there's already going to be plenty of that as it is). So, if you would kindly, reread this chapter, and I'll post the one I wrote to replace the next tomorrow.**

 **Please forgive me.**

 **NOT QUITE AS IMPORTANT:**

 **Rambling time. This will hopefully take the place of the rambling I tend to do in my stories, though I don't hold out much hope for this either. Although, if anyone cared to notice, I have been going back and making some edits to try and make some of the segments more readable. I mean, there are parts which are awkward for even me to read, and that's unacceptable.**

 **What's more painful is the treatment of the characters, Ozpin and Jaune in particular. I made the former too feckless and the latter too competent. After taking a step back, I remember just how much of a whiny bitch Jaune was, and that hasn't been totally fixed yet. It shouldn't, in fact, be fixed for a while, but hopefully more than in canon. Ozpin on the other hand should be more assertive, more confident in his decisions- even when he isn't sure about them. Anyways, like I said, these two replacement chapters should make up for this.**

 **Wow, is this really all I have to say? Well, perhaps not, but I lost it in favor of shit that actually matters. Which reminds me:**

 **Would you all kindly let me know when I make such a grievous error? I know there are at least like, five of you or something. I'd like to know if I fixed things or if I mucked them up even worse. Not that it'll change anything...**

* * *

"Come on, Ruby, let's go."

Such a voice that she would follow it to the end of the world if only to remember who waited for her there, outside the blackness. By her right arm it pulled her along, out of the conoscopic diffusion and into the aperture tube which compressed her down to sneak through the gaps in time.

"I don't wanna!"

Betraying words, echoing from somewhere behind her in a pitch that was stretched by how rapidly she was pulling away from it. Mortified, she tried to deny them but was laughed off by that voice which could heal all wounds.

"Come now, you have to go to school. Don't you want to grow up like your sister?"

Yellow star twinkling at the end of the tunnel, turning, winking, shooting on ahead.

"Can't I stay here with you?"

That would be more than enough to satisfy her, falling back into the fabric of the universe until it crystallized around her, preserving this moment for all eternity.

"My silly girl," Tinkling laugh shimmering color. "I'll be right here when you're done. I'm not going anywhere. Now, come on, we don't want you to be late."

"But-"

She wanted to call out, to tell it to wait, but it had already gone on ahead and took her arm with it.

"You lied."

"No way!"

"Seriously? You got into Beacon?! I'm so jealous!"

Colors fracturing all around, sharp ends like thorns digging into her and trying to keep her there.

"Heh, yeah, it's pretty wild. I can hardly believe it myself." She didn't want to, but there was no denying her voice which sounded so light, unconstrained by the pressure mounting all around her. "Still, I'm going to miss you guys. I don't know when I'll get a chance to see you again."

Seeing nothing now but shards of stained glass depicting a scene from a story that was unrelatable.

"Don't worry! We'll catch up soon enough, and we'll write to you every day in your fantasy castle." Joints of lead crept in around her shoulders, not reassuring in the slightest. "Until then, we'll just have to make do with this to remember you by."

With that, she was pushed on ahead while the fragmented picture collapsed into the past, stealing her other arm with it.

"You lied."

"Really, I'm fine, Ruby."

At last, a tone to match her mood. Despondent, disillusioned, despairing. Color fading into black and white.

"I'm just headed out to meet a friend. After all this, don't you think I'd tell you if there was something wrong?"

Knowing what would happen next, she chased after as it retreated into nothing. The first step backwards severing her leg mid-stride and sending her tumbling back into darkness.

"You lied."

' _I promise I will still be here, no matter what.'_ Naruto's voice filled her memory from the inside out, reverberations sending cracks throughout her fragile body. _'That's a promise of a thousand-million lifetimes.'_

Every single generation passing her by in a flash until she found herself at that end dreamed about so long ago. A shell of her former self, without a leg to stand on.

"You lied."

Laying there in ultimatum, no friends or family in sight. The only one having kept their promise being death, that mordant fiend- friend, stranger, familiar, clad in crimson cloak with scythe raised above her head. Mercifully quick, an instant, smashing that hourglass resting on its side and severing the last connections to a stagnant life that was tragically short, yet which dragged on so cruelly long…

* * *

The sound of an alarm rescued her as it frequently had before, reminding her that she still had to get up, get dressed, go to class, and do all those other things which were expected of normal people. Not only that, but these days it harped the fact that she was not normal, that her body was one around which so many others revolved. Distant, eccentric orbit shackled to an inescapable yet intangible truth like a black hole.

Suddenly, getting up felt all the harder. A pointless resistance to the gravity trying to swallow her.

"I thought she had been stabilized?"

Sound at the edge of her solar system, at the edge of concern.

"She was. The wound on the right wrist was closed before we even got her on the gurney. Heart-rate had been normalizing ever since the transfusion."

"Internal bleeding?"

"No sign of it. Bruising is contained, and the swelling on the left ankle is even starting to go down."

"Then what the heck is going on?"

Colors, coming to her from lightyears away, fuzzy and diffuse.

"Nightmare?"

"Hang on- I think she's conscious." A sun swung in close, and she tracked it as it passed a couple times over her horizon. "Ms. Rose? Can you hear me? We're the medical team, and right now you're on your way to Glade General Hospital. You were banged up pretty good, do you remember any of that? Can you describe for me your injuries?"

All four of her limbs had been ripped off and her body shattered into a thousand-million pieces. But for some reason, they seemed to think they could save her.

"Are you sure she's awake?"

"She tracked the flashlight."

"Maybe it's the pain from the fracture. Did we give her an anesthetic?"

Oddly enough, she wasn't in all that much pain. Consistent with her dream-memory, her body overall felt numb. Except for that gaping hole in her chest.

"No, heart-rate was too slow when we got her. Sedatives in such a small body might have killed her."

"Hardly seems to be a problem now." Another meteor plunged in overhead, blocking out more of that glaring light. "Are you uncomfortable, hon? Would you like a pain-killer?"

What she'd like was for her friends to be there, something familiar to cling on to so that she didn't slip away into the darkness again.

"I don't think she has the strength to talk right now."

Words, things which could never penetrate the vacuum. Not for lack of trying- she opened her mouth to tell them:

I don't want to be alone.

But all that came out was:

"Blllaaarggh!"

Vomit, stale and acidic filled the oxygen mask pressed tight over her mouth, robbing her of breath and flinging those hovering geoids far out of her trajectory.

"Shit! Screw it, clean her up now! I'm giving her a tranquilizer."

No, no, no, no, no. Do not go gently into that good night. Her mind reeled against the prospect even as her body began to shut down, fought against the solitary dreams in which the only light was a fading glow from the past or too far off in the future for her to ever reach.

This was not what she wanted. She didn't want to die.

Not alone.

* * *

Alone. Always alone. From the day they were born, henceforth into an eternity of solitude, deprived all vindication of life.

Who knew that there were so many types of loneliness? Caged like an animal, far away from one's home, family, in the presence only of hostile strangers. Exiled in plain sight against the wall of a thousand cold shoulders. Physical prisons, wherein one was locked away underneath stone and earth and forgotten by the world.

Sequestered in the confines of one's own mind, wrapped in chains like the arms of a warm embrace. Self-imposed solitary the most difficult to escape.

Tears fall upon the shadow of the mind, a shadow like a great beast with tails flailing, trying to seek out an end to it all. Darkness spreads, snuffing out luminous ideas, broken thoughts like fangs poking holes in lofty dreams.

Suddenly realizing that they were the shadow of intent, forever awaiting action. Fingers become the iron bars of the cage which keeps them trapped in the past.

* * *

"~So long adolescence of the frightened soul

You're entering the ritual

Lay down your every fear upon the altar child

Prepare to play the man's role~"

More beeping. This time steady like a metronome, keeping pace with a somber song wafting in from far away.

"~Lay me down on sacramental ground

Lay me low in times of woe~"

Lain down in a soft bed. She could feel that much now past the anesthetic burying her limbs in sand. They were so heavy she couldn't lift her arm to silence that constant and grating drone. Everything was heavy, her eyelids buried underneath the vast Vacuo desert. Bright light beating down on her and not letting her rest. -Yet it was still a tad chilly, dry breeze rasping over the single cotton sheet draped over her.

Breaking through the crust, she opened her eyes. Squinting around at her surroundings revealed a whiteness more than wind-tumble quartz grains could ever emulate. It immediately gave her a headache. She wanted just to turn away, crawl into the indentation of the mattress and back into the imaginary realm between waking and opening her eyes.

"~Headlong little one into the wild unknown

With the creatures and the cold night

Stay strong the sound of screaming's just the sacred rite

Of death begetting new life~"

Words not affecting her nearly so much as the timbre, the flow, slow and somber as a dirge. Welcoming, accompanying, leading her away from the prickliness creeping in through her fingers and back to the unfeeling depths of slumber.

"~Lay me down on sacramental ground

Lay me low in times of woe~"

Couldn't do that, she couldn't sleep any longer. Baby steps, her eyes were open to the discourteously bright light, and now she had to get her head out of the dirt to see what else her situation held.

Where numbness cut off at the elbows she pushed herself, shuffled backwards like a sidewinder up the gentle slope of her pillow.

"~There's a road less traveled and a life less led

And it's the path between your spirit and the voice in your head

We are here but for the grace of everything divine

It's the providence that we must find-"

Exhausted upon reaching the top, wanting nothing more than to roll back down and sleep until the dry wasteland around her found life once again. She felt out of place, it was too still, too deathly quiet.

It was quiet. Silent, except for the steady beat which chimed like a glass heart.

Above her the breeze had stopped, and next to her on the nightstand the radio had fallen silent, Blake's finger removed from the ancient thing with a slight click.

"Sorry," The black-haired woman apologized, replacing her rear into the shapely indentation of the emerald upholstered chair. "It looked like the music was upsetting you."

"Mm-nn." Ruby shook her head slowly, the room and its other inhabitants staying mostly in place. "I-"

No puke came up this tame, thankfully, but that was probably because she'd been drained of everything.

"Oh. Hang on." Getting up, Blake slunk out of ward, and Ruby was left to wonder if she ever would have figured out Blake's Faunus nature on her own.

On her own, again. Alone, again.

No- not alone, spying the unforgettable spray of hair from her sister strewn over the bottom of her mattress. Her other half sprawled haphazardly in another institutional chair, twisted at an angle which would be uncomfortable when she finally awoke… however long that would be.

How long had it been? Long enough to become entrenched to her bed, sprouting a number of wires and tubes which grew from her skin like roots. Long enough to lose the rest of her human trappings, replaced only by a paper-dress and wooden stiffness.

A better question would be what had happened during the battle, those memories being even harder to access than her limbs.

"Here you go." A Styrofoam cup was pressed gently into her unbending fingers, pale hand curling gently around both and guided the straw into her cracked lips. "Slow sips."

Mechanically she followed the instructions, slowly swelling back to life with each drop that made it past the parched surface.

"There you go." There it went, all the water disappearing into the dark pit of her stomach. "Doing better?"

"Mm." Still not trusting her words, not relying on her own muscles to guide the cup over to the tray.

"You want some more?"

She shook her head no. "What-" Her body decided otherwise, protesting with spiking coughs that she tried to stifle with arms that wouldn't move to her command and lungs that rebelled against the flooding.

"Take it easy."

Unable to listen as the spasms violently shook her corpse out of stillness. Only when it finally settled did she realize Blake's hands were the only things keeping her sitting up. This did not brew confidence in her body, least of all her historically untrustworthy mouth. Instead, she pleaded to her teammate with her already watery eyes for some kind of good news.

"Well, we won."

Obviously. All of them were alive and mostly well, Ruby herself being the most injured. Weiss was there too, sitting in the opposite corner. Propped upright with only her head lolling to the side and an indulgent waterfall of drool sneaking past lips that even in sleep were pursed in irritation.

Everything appeared right with the world. Yet the echoes of her dreams continued to reverberate through the quiet room and within Blake's hollow words.

It all felt empty.

"You're safe. We're safe. You shouldn't concern yourself with anything else right now. Not after what you went through."

That was right. She was right. So long as they were alive, everything else could be mended. Bones, bricks, flesh, friendships.

Even still.

-Even so, she could hardly muster enough concentration to do simple things, like realize when another cup of slightly chilled water was squeezed into her hands.

"Drink."

Come the last drop, she had almost enough coordination to place the empty vessel on the bedside tray to her left. The slight overbalance making her finally notice her mummified right arm, the splints strapped to it accounting for some part of her rigidity.

She stared at the foreign appendage for a while, trying to recall all the time which had disappeared into that black trench of sleep. It was almost a pity that Blake was the only one who was awake, given the woman wasn't very talkative on a normal day.

Locked in her own silence for so long, Ruby longed for something besides that sterile, electric tone pelting away at her groggy head.

"How-" Taking matters into her own, manually lubricating her lips with her tongue. "How l-long-?"

"Easy," Quick enough to react, pulling out her scroll and checking the hour. "Almost two days, on the dot. Doctors thought you'd be out for at least another twenty-four hours."

Ruby nodded like it made sense. But she supposed anything would, waking unto that island of thought. Her dreams had been choppy and suffocating, and the only thing she could say for certain was in front of her.

But there had been something in those depths. Leviathan of a secret contained within the silvery reflections of a past she never knew, within the head of a boy with golden hair.

No answers here, she had to crawl onwards.

"I'm sorry." Ruby surprised even herself that she was able to eke these words out past the heaviness which migrated to her chest. "I guess I worried you, huh?"

Left dumbstruck, Blake tried to deny the matching black bags under her eyes as well as the rut she had worn in the floor. Before she could, Ruby found the words that she had spent those many sleepless nights looking for.

"I should have been stronger. I should have been a better leader. I should have been a better friend." Saltwater threatened to consume her again, but she held it at bay. "I should… I should have known better."

"-Ruby," Those sleepless nights had not been enough to prepare her for this inevitable conversation. "You've nothing to be sorry over. I-"

It had been all her fault. There was no denying this- even if she had tried to run away from it, the truth and her comrades.

"I never thought it would get this out of hand." Still so weak. She would wear the title of 'scaredy-cat' without irony, but with shame.

Ruby smiled, the first since she woke up. It crinkled the corners of her mouth which were still quite dry despite the occasional drool that Blake had to wipe off.

"Yeah, ever since I met Naruto, things have been getting a bit crazy, haven't they?"

Blake bit her lips, fear once again trying to stifle her. Fear of rejection- of making the wrong move and destroying all she had worked for. And yet, she was still here. Previously, she'd be able to blame her own troublesome ghost for forcing her to do things she didn't want to. What kept her shackled to Ruby's bedside might have had its roots with Shikamaru, but it was now wholly hers.

Guilt.

"Ruby, there's something else you should know…"

* * *

"…So, are you satisfied, Ozpin?"

His perpetual smile might have given this impression, but like the scalding mug poised at his lips, it was just an adornment which served little purpose outside reality. The true litmus would come when he set down the report balanced in his other hand.

"Someone in my position can rarely afford that sort of complacency." Flipping the cover-sheet back in place and neatly tossing the papers into a growing stack, Ozpin took a careful sip of his drink and acknowledged his visitor for the first time since they'd handed him the report. "-But I am pleased, James. From what I saw, and now the handlers' report, Penny is meeting or exceeding all expectations. Even with the intervening incident, I think we can call this a victory. No one died, nothing of strategic value was lost, and we came out of it with valuable information."

Working on his scroll while Ozpin was perusing the document, general Ironwood now replaced this in his breast pocket before giving the man his undivided attention. Not looking nearly so pleased as his counterpart.

"Maybe for you. The only thing illuminated by this is that I have a serious security breach that needs to be taken care of before I can even consider mobilizing forces for the Vytal festival. That, and Project Copperhead is looking less and less like a sound investment."

"Oh?" Looking as surprised as he ever did, Ozpin cocked an eyebrow. "I thought Ms. Poledina handled herself splendidly. She can hardly be faulted for letting that X-Class Grimm escape after it changed its mind."

"-Only because there was something else it wanted _**more**_." Heretofore relaxing in the carved high-back chair provided for him and becoming one with the furniture, now Ironwood appeared ready to spring forward as if loaded onto one of Ozpin's student catapults. "You should have told me that stronger Dust attracted stronger Grimm."

Ozpin shrugged, in the same move gesturing to his bookshelf which occupied one whole wall of the office- the only wall which wasn't glazed over in windows. Its shelves sagged with the burden of Remnant's past.

"I would have thought this to be a risk you considered. It is fairly well-known that the first major Dust deposits were discovered because there were Grimm nests guarding them. It is also the reason that there has never been idol worship of Dust as a form of Deity. Human admiration is quite easily dwarfed by human fear."

Red Oak was no match for Ironwood as the man's metal hand absently came down hard on his armrest.

"-That doesn't help me now, Oz! I have constituents who want results. And unlike you, I **need** their support, or else they're threatening to back Schnee for the next election. The weapon they wanted doesn't do what was promised- it actually **attracts** Grimm. This only complicates the other issues that I'm dealing with. We're on the cusp of crisis. With demand for Dust rising, Atlas' mines can't keep up. The only other resources are too hard to get to one way or another, either too deep or too overrun by Grimm. Penny was supposed to solve the second issue, but now that won't work. So we're left with trying to exploit places which have been black-listed for decades- and we will, because people need that Dust. You think our Faunus attrition rates are bad now? In comparison to Dust, their lives just got a lot cheaper."

"What would you have me do, James?" Smile having since vanished and mug set to the side, Ozpin regarded Ironwood with equal intensity. "You know I can't provide any help with security issues up North. And I already gave you what you asked for with regards to Poledina. I am sorry if you don't feel it was a fruitful trade, but the exchange cannot be reversed."

Ironwood seethed silently, doing more unintentional damage to the irreplaceable furniture before his hand let up with an audible creak.

"Double or nothing."

"Excuse me?"

For the first time- ever- Ozpin was the one to be taken aback, and the General allowed himself a small smirk for this accomplishment.

"I know you want Penny. Take her- and the Dust. Call it a show of goodwill between our two kingdoms, flaunt her all you want. In exchange, I want mining rights to the Fox Islands."

Another first as far as Ironwood was concerned- Ozpin frowned. Not just a pensive look or mild indigestion, but a pointed expression of distaste. And it was directed at him. He enjoyed the previous surprise far better.

"There is a very good reason those Islands are off limits."

"And you've yet to tell me it." Adopting a relaxed pose with his fist perched under his chin, Ironwood was in fact trying to disguise the deep gulp he experienced forcing this gamble. "We both know it isn't for the Grimm, they won't go near the place. And I can't exactly go back to Atlas without at least a plausible excuse. Unless, of course, _you'd_ like to explain it to them…"

Ozpin almost broke with the stoicism to praise the man in his conniving. There was a fine line between having men like Ironwood indebted to you, and having them reliant on you for their position of power. This was what James was truly wagering against him, knowing that there were only a few things he wanted less than Schnee in charge of the Kingdom.

"I'll consider it." Eyes firmly shut and no longer looking at the General. In fatigue, in contemplation, either way Ironwood knew his que.

"That's all I ask." He stood carefully with arms raised in surrender. "I'll be in Vale a few more days, but you can always contact me in your usual way." Pausing in his tactical retreat, "Sorry about the chair."

There was no sign Ozpin heard him, and he frankly didn't want to wait and find out what would be revealed when the man next opened his eyes. Ironwood's exit was marked by a pneumatic hiss, and the chime of the clock overhead striking three.

"How important are those islands?"

Another chime came in response to this probe.

' _Either extremely, or not at all.'_ Being in one of his rare serious moods, Ozpin didn't question Jiraiya's flippant answer. _'_ _ **It's**_ _either there, or it isn't. I'd give a higher than 50% chance, though, knowing the rumors that've spread around those islands. To me, it isn't worth it.'_

' _I also must ask what it benefits us to have the gynoid back in our fold. Was she not to be our agent to hold Ironwood accountable?'_

"Yes and no." Quitting the sleepy posture if not his actual fatigue, Ozpin leaned back so that he could properly face the conversation. "I also feel that James has a legitimate concern. Atlas is one of the foremost exporters of Dust, not only because of their reserves, but because of their experience in mining it. If even they are running out of options, it could be a problem. With the SDC turning their attention Southward, it means they think there is a legitimate chance of turning a profit."

' _-Which is_ _ **exactly**_ _why this situation has the potential to turn tits-up.'_ Jiraiya sighed, not even the thought of those glorious mounds could lighten the mood. _'We're damned if we do, damned if we don't. We_ _ **can't**_ _let anyone find it, not until we figure out what it does- and_ _ **we**_ _can't find it- not with the piss-poor mining equipment Vale has. Schnee will find his Dust alright, one way or another. It's just a matter of what else he digs up.'_

' _Not even mentioning the issues this will bring with the White-Fang in either case. It certainly is a quagmire.'_ Not disagreeing with her subordinate's assessment, nor even his crass phrasing, even the experienced politician could see no clean way to cover their bases. _'-Likely to become even more so when the question comes to that android. Poledina does not seem like the kind of man to give up his work without a fight. Nor do I think the General would willingly let the man come to our side.'_

"The General will have to make some compromises, and he knows this." Ozpin clicked his tongue, already knowing that he would have to be swallowing some rather distasteful decisions himself. "-Though I'd as soon ignore this latter issue. It doesn't sit well to me, treating that girl like a bargaining chip. Besides, if your suppositions are true, nothing matters as much as that Statue."

' _If it still exists.'_ Koharu reminded, knowing it was useless semantics. _'And we still do not know for sure that it is there. We are making a lot of suppositions based on speculation.'_

' _Either way, I'd not want to gamble on it.'_ Jiraiya too clucked, demonstrating where Ozpin had picked up this passive habit. _'But do we have a choice? You people have based so much of your society on Dust, that to quit cold turkey could destroy it. I suppose this situation was inevitable, we'd find out if we were right sooner or later.'_

Ozpin sighed, opening a drawer in his desk which allowed a soft white light to flood into the darkened room, frame his face in multicolor shadow.

"I suppose, sooner or later, we all have to face our past, don't we?"

* * *

"Now just hang on Ruby! You only now woke up and you're injured! I can't let you get out of bed, let alone go anywhere!"

"Yang's right! Quit moving around before you end up doing something you'll regret!"

Regret? There was plenty she could in fact regret, all those mistakes sticking out of her stream of consciousness like stepping-stones, begging to be swept away- much how she swept away the electrodes from her arms and yanked the IV out of her wrist before anyone could stop her. That was as far as she got, though, and for the first time she regretted not being faster when both her sister and Weiss jumped on her before she could stick a toe out from under her covers.

"Calm down, Ruby, you're not thinking straight! There's probably still anesthetic in your system."

True, that if she had her wherewithal, she would have escaped their crucifying clutches with just a trickle of her Semblance. But the only thing coursing through her veins right now was the burbling desire to fly straight to the headmaster's office to demand he return what was not rightfully his.

"Please stop struggling, you're going to reopen your wound!"

"I swear, you better not get blood on me- Damnit! Blake, quit standing there and turn that thing off!"

Over their racket the heart-monitor's siren continued to wail loudly, protesting its loss of an electrical signal. Blake was meanwhile trying to disappear into a fold of the curtain, but Weiss' outburst was enough to shock her into action and she leapt at the off-switch.

"There! Now help us get a hold of her!"

Having done the one without question, Blake now hesitated at this new command. Stopping cold, as if awaiting the outcome of an internal debate which could now be heard without the blaring alarm. All the while her other two teammates continued to struggle with their captain whose writhing motions shook the wheeled bed and whose violent flailing appeared to be wearing on both the girls' patients and their muscles.

"What are you just standing there for?" Shooting her head around, Yang glared at her partner. "Grab her legs before she hurts herself!"

Just then, Blake watched as the little girl's powerful legs posted into the bed and bucked her hips against her human restraints.

"Crap! When did Ruby get so strong?" Hanging on with all her might to her captain's supposedly injured arm, Weiss had to admit that at this point they were likely the ones to get hurt. "Seriously Blake, any time you want to jump in would be great!"

Wondering if they were not already past that point, wondering if she had made a mistake sending the nurse home for the night, Yang dared not glance back at Blake to see the woman's answer. Nor did she have the strength to look at her sister who was now more animal than her Faunus partner, throwing herself against the fleshy bars of her cage.

So, instead, she shut her eyes and held on.

"…I'm sorry…"

This whisper from far away floated in like a hammer, making Ruby's bridged back collapse against the white ripples of her sheets. It smashed the reservoir of adrenaline pumping through her veins, letting the liquid spill out silently down her cheeks as she fell still.

Collapsing next to her, Weiss caught herself on her knees and the corner of Ruby's bed while Yang lost consciousness on her feet. Still awake, but unable or unwilling to comprehend what was going on behind her sister's exhausted stare.

"…Why…?" Plaintively Ruby begged, asking more to the heavens than the three in the room. "How could you?"

But none of the gods, mortal or otherwise, were listening, and the burden rained back down on their shoulders. The three who had made the decision while she was asleep felt the brunt of it.

"Why?" An unearthly cold came to inhabit Yang's void, conduct her lifeless limbs. "It's just a rock. How is it… that **thing** came to make you like this?"

That question appeared perched on the verge of tears, but Ruby was not moved. Neither was to give an inch.

"He was my friend."

"And I'm your sister!" Over the frigid stillness swept this wave, nearly knocking over the bystanders Blake and Weiss. "How could you… how could you lie to me?"

"Yang…" Rediscovering her sibling at the same time she found herself sitting upright, Ruby reached out with an arm that had again lost its strength.

Strength that Yang found, regaining control of herself and releasing the other self with a sigh.

"I'm not stupid, you know." Sidelined though they were, neither Blake nor Weiss were exempt from the guilt of this statement. "I get that I'm easy going… so in that way, maybe it's my fault. I knew a while ago that something wasn't quite right, and I did nothing. Is it… is it wrong that I'm glad they're gone? I know I don't deserve it, but I want my sister back. I want my _team_ back. I just want to rewind everything to before this happened. Can't we do that? Can't we at least pretend?"

Even as she asked the question, Yang was afraid of the answer she might receive. Glancing around revealed Blake's slightly drooping feline ears, the normally infallible Weiss glancing sidelong while fidgeting with the empty space on her wrist, and Ruby…

Just stared at her, nonesuch empathy, or comprehension, or even pity. Only a polished vacancy where there used to be someone she knew.

"Normal knees." For lack of something to lash out against Yang's fists turned on themselves, clenching and unclenching impotently. "When we came here… all you wanted was to be normal. Not to be special in any way or stick out. -And Weiss, you wanted to be free of your family's legacy! Blake- I'm sure that I still don't get what you're going through, but it's pretty clear to me that you just wanted a fresh start, and that's why you hid who you really were. And me…"

Another deep breath as her muscles went slack and Yang tried to let go, of her pride, of everything but what mattered.

"I suppose I want action. Ruby's got her sugar, but for me it's the adrenaline rush. That night… that night was too much. Like a binge, because afterwards I felt guilty just thinking about what I could have _lost_."

Yang shivered at these saccharine thoughts still tingling in her bloodstream, and wondered if it wasn't too late already.

"This is _way_ too much for us! It's too dangerous! I know that it's damned tempting. The power those things have, it's an easy ticket. I'd be lying if I said that adventure is the only thing I want out of this. I need to get stronger too…" Shaking her head definitively. "But I can't. Not at the cost of my sister. I'm not going to lose you too."

"I-"

In the wake of this Ruby was left to her thoughts, by herself to find some way to express how she felt. Never, not even in those cloistered dreams did she feel quite so isolated and alone.

"I don't want to lose anyone either."

Under that paper dress feeling naked, and under the anticipatory eyes of those dear to her feeling more than stripped. Flayed, gutted, clutching at the empty space in her chest.

"But I guess… none of us are strong enough to guarantee that, huh?" A bitter chuckle which echoed in her ribcage. "I know I'm certainly not. Remember Yang, how I couldn't even take care of Mr. Dreiling?" Ruby turned to the other two who were trying not to be there. Which was okay, because there was a sense that Ruby wasn't really looking at them. "When I was nine, I wanted my own pet to take care of, so Dad got me a hamster. Strange how now I can't even remember what he looked like. I only got to take care of him for about a week when I accidently left his cage open and he escaped."

Returning focus to her sister, Ruby managed to conjure up a twisted smile in the form of an apology.

"I remember that we looked everywhere for him for several days. We were on our hands and knees, poking our heads into bushes and Yang got her hair caught more than once." In spite of the tension and what was obviously not a pleasant memory, Yang too managed to summon a smile in retrospect. "Of course, we never found him. Dad and Sis told me that he likely got snatched up by a fox or something. But I know that it was our dog, Zwei, who ate him."

While Yang choked, Ruby finally managed a laugh that wasn't painful.

"I'm not stupid either, you know." Fingers clawed at the frustratingly flat spot beneath her collar. "-Just foolish, I suppose. Immature. It was me who forget to lock the cage. I wasn't capable of keeping anything I loved safe back then, and now even with _Crescent Rose_ … it's no different."

With the unbandaged hand she forcibly pried her other arm away, glaring at it unfamiliarly and with disdain.

"I came here to try and help others, but I couldn't even protect something that was tied around my neck, let alone those people around me. Moreover, I needed help just to save myself. You're right, I don't deserve the responsibility."

"Oh, Ruby…?" What was supposed to be supportive came off instead as confused when the young girl swung her legs off the bed and onto the floor. "-Hang on, you're still supposed to be in bed."

"I need to see Ozpin." Calmly brushing off the several hands offering support, Ruby adjusted the paltry vestments as they rested on her shoulders while she searched her space for proper clothes.

"Still? Can't it wait until tomorrow?"

"It's already well past midnight." Chimed in Blake while shadowing the smaller girl in case she should falter in her stride. "I doubt that he's still here."

"He is." Even with her head in the closet, the absolute certainty was not muffled. "And it's important that I talk to him. He'll want to pick a new captain as soon as possible after I resign."

Vocal protestations flew around her head with less effect than would gnats. Effectively swatting them away, she stripped off her invalid garb without a glance backwards.

"Now just hang on!" Springing forward, it wasn't that hard to shield Ruby's naked body with her own, not least because she was not struggling nearly as hard against Yang's well-meaning embrace. It was, however, a stark realization just how much larger, how much more developed the younger girl felt within her swaddling arms whereas previously she could simply disappear beneath Yang's shadow. "Please, just calm down and think about this for a bit, okay? Nothing needs to be done now. We should talk about it when we're all in better heads."

"I have thought about it." Without Naruto there to guide her, Ruby would have to do more independent thinking. This was less liberating than one might assume. Constrained instead, to failure. "As I am, I'm not suited to lead this team."

"Well, so what?" With a light blush, Weiss turned away from the shear attention she garnered -Or, maybe it was that one look which was still clad only in her birthday suit? "Look- we're still in school, right? So who cares if we make a little mistake now and then? The whole purpose of us being here is to improve."

"You know, Naruto said almost the same thing." When Ruby smiled so tenderly at her, the crimson burned hot and furiously across Weiss' pale face. And when that smiled died, so did the spring bloom. "It's just that I don't think I have that luxury anymore."

"What do you mean?"

Though having done her best to cut the heartstrings which tied her to this conversation, Blake knew to what the girl referred.

"The White Fang are my problem and I'll deal with them. There's no reason for any of you to get involved." This said, Blake never had much luck with severing such ties. No matter how hard she tried to keep it all in, she was always shedding bits of herself wherever she went.

"Of course there is." Much as she'd feared, she'd grown accustomed to that wide, earnest face innocently staring her down. "I could never abandon a friend."

A Doberman's bark would not have more effect than those puppy-dog eyes, and Blake flinched as if snapped at.

"You really have listened to him…"

"Sorry, but that's 100% Ruby." Yang declared, maneuvering for a cheeky smile while at the same time making sure no other cheek showed. "-And I'm with her on this one. No way you're doing anything stupid alone."

"Can we not do anything stupid at all?" Placing a hand on her forehead, Weiss considered the merits of sitting back down in her chair- whether she'd be able to get back up again.

"I'm also worried about Roman Torchwick." With a shiver that may or may not have had anything to do with her state of undress, Ruby admitted this. "Even without Naruto and the others, I don't think he's going to quit."

"You do seem to have some bad luck with always running into that shmuck." Yang agreed.

"That's why I just want to try and minimize the stupid mistakes." Determined in this commitment, more than the others could hope to be after a thousand reincarnations. "I'm never going have the confidence of my Sis. I'll never be the meticulous planner like Weiss. And Blake's got that natural intuition I couldn't achieve even with an actual _ninja_ helping me. I don't have any of that. We're talking about going up against _real_ dangers, and I couldn't bare the thought of losing any one of you."

A sentiment that touched them all the same and yet differently. Wanting to simply wrap her arms tight around her sibling, Yang had to restrain herself out of both delicacy and reverence. Such a bright ideal that Blake had to turn her head, and Weiss-

"Idiot." Glad she chose to remain standing a little longer. "That's _why_ you're the only one who should be captain."

With the flabbergasted looks she was receiving, it was a good thing Weiss already had her eyes clenched against the vein throbbing in her forehead.

"Yes, yes, I know. Like I said: we learn from our mistakes. And in case you haven't noticed, you're the epitome of that! The fact that you've clearly thought about all this while on death's door is as admirable as it is exasperating.

"Look- We've all got our strengths and we've all got our weaknesses. Life's not always going to wait until we're all prepped and ready so that's why I'm no longer bidding for the job. You, Ruby, are the one who flipped from being flatfooted to giving Roman the boot. You're the one who was pushed ahead two grades because of this and had to deal with it. You are the one who gets saddled with a talking Dust crystal and just _**rolls with it**_!

" **Clearly** Yang is right. This is too much and we're not ready. But we're stuck in it now, and you're the best choice to get us out of it in one piece… more or less."

No longer propped up by the argument which had likely been festering since that night, Weiss deflated and collapsed back into the waiting seat while the others watched enraptured.

"Now, can we please go back to bed?" Draped over the stiff-backed chair which moaned in sympathy, Weiss didn't even have the energy to protest should this not be the case.

"That sounds like a good idea." Ready and able to find herself a nice spot to curl up just about anywhere, Blake commiserated with a drawn-out yawn.

"Mm. You guys go right ahead." Ruby did not anticipate being that far behind. Despite being unconscious for so long, these few hours were enough to drain anyone even if they hadn't already been empty. "I'll be fine here. It'd be better if you slept in your real beds."

"I'm not going to get much sleep if I have to worry about you waltzing around at this hour." A look that Ruby hadn't seen in a while made her sweat regardless of the relative cool.

"Relax, Yang." Able to brush off even this, Ruby gave her sister an assuring smile. "I'll always be here. That's a promise of a lifetime."

One she could keep easily, the thought of passing back through that surface of sleep no longer so cold and fearsome.

"Alright, Squirt." Removing herself until just a hand was left on Ruby's cheek. "Don't ever change, Ruby."

Turning around, Yang swiftly collected the others who didn't have the strength to put up much resistance- or any at all in Weiss's case, as she was unceremoniously tossed over the blonde's shoulder.

Energy enough though, as she was carried like a sack of potatoes out of the infirmary, to yell back one last thing at her troublesome captain.

"And for goodness'- sake- put some clothes on!"

* * *

Within every glass window which circumscribed his office, the view was all the same: A dark reflection of the interior. Sparse furniture in fuzzy disarray, shadows of toothy cogs gnashing like the boogiemen which loitered in the back of the mind. Ironwood had long since gone away, leaving his vacant chair as a faded cenotaph in the middle of the room.

But all Ozpin saw was his own pale image, staring back at him from the place where Vale should be. The city just another piece of that black mirror now, with the newly established curfew snuffing out all the lights. Not even the ocean with its glistening ripples of moonlight could reach him in his high tower, it was all too far away and drowned out by the backscatter.

Haloed in that light, the man appraised his mortal appearance with disdain. Hands too weak to do what was necessary- eyes burdened with such baggage that he couldn't see what that was. Everything about his appearance was much as it had been decades ago, but to him it all spoke about his age and neglect.

And that silver hair- that he begrudged most of all. Only a shade, a stain apart from a dead white.

"Some things never change, do they? No matter how hard we try…"

Glaring at his reflection, it stared back with the burn of a red dawn.

"We still have to keep pushing forward blindly. For what other option is there?"

"To quit the world. Just… let go."

"I can't do that, not yet."

"Neither of us can give up. We are two sides to the same coin, aren't we, Oz?" Within the creeping darkness the image had changed only slightly. Lines of his visage going to places where, but for the grace of gods long lost, he might have ended up. "One face in light, the other in darkness."

"Darkness will take me eventually, and I await that day. But I will not make it easy."

"Silly man, long ago you chose to run and now you can never stop. To and froe, going nowhere."

"You're wrong." Closing his eyes so that he didn't need to see the ruby-red suns winking at him. Folded his hands behind his back so that they didn't show his fear and breathed heavy so that he couldn't hear the backtalk. "I've moved on from the past which is your grave. Where you will rot away until you are nothing."

"Nothing is what I came from, being reborn from that dark pit of despair. Don't forget, you were the one who chose the light, watching as the world burned." Cold slivers of darkness reached out from their crystalline prison. Obsidian fingers caressed his cheek, and even thought he wasn't looking he could _feel_ them.

"-Meanwhile, you turned your back on the world. Is that any better?"

"I **have become** better. More. I am the future, the memory, the possibility which haunts you. Grow old all you want, run from the truth as fast as you can, hide from me in those many incarnations, but I will always find you."

The sultry daggers pulled themselves back into the abyss without so much as a bead of sweat to show as a prize. But Ozpin knew that they had already taken so much more.

"I am your guilt, your deepest regret, and you will never escape me…"

"I don't need to escape you." All of this he already knew, repeating it only to himself and not to the ghoulish image which had long since vanished. Emerald eyes snapped open but only to confront a pale travesty.

"You are my mistake, and I will _**erase**_ you."

His only answer was from the real sun which had by now started its arduous journey over the horizon, framing the expansive landscape as it unfolded in daguerreotype.

And where behind him there might have been an amused cackle only in his mind, there came a rapping and the laughing creek of his door as it opened.

"Headmaster?" Thankful for the voice of Glynda Goodwitch which never allowed compromise. "You're here early. That's unusual."

"There's lots of unusual work to be done." He turned to her with a grin which came easy.

Glynda arched an eyebrow in accusation of his excuse.

"There **always** is." Leaving the comment to hang there, she'd already moved on, depositing another sheave of work on his desk next to the other which looked to have yet been touched. "What else is new?"

"The world, I suppose." Turning back to it, Ozpin watched as the light quickly spread once the sun passed the mountain. "It moves in mysterious ways, with or without you. Every succeeding generation bringing something different to the age-old story." New problems, new drama, he neglected to mention. "Even the sunrise can come as a surprise if you spend long enough in darkness. I should try to catch it more often, because moments like this are ever so fleeting."

"Try doing my job for a few weeks." Unaffected by her boss' rhetoric, Glynda bustled about the office automatically. Cleaning up the pages which had spilled across the floor while simultaneously fixing them both their drinks of choice from the small bar tucked off to the side with all the other clutter. "You'll get used to it soon enough."

"It is my sincerest hope that I never do."

Stopping just short of the headmaster, Glynda held both mugs in her hands as she silently appraised the man. Even staring at his back, she could tell that there was something different.

"-Ozpin?"

"You are right though, there is much work which needs to be done." Not yet perceiving the woman behind him nor the steaming beverage which would replace the lukewarm mug languishing on his desk. "Glynda, see if you can't catch Ironwood before he leaves. Just tell him he has my provisional acceptance."

"Sir." Not put out in the slightest by the abrupt turnaround. If anything, Glynda seemed to pick up on the unusualness of this request and relished in the opportunity to set things into motion. -Anything outside of the routine.

Hurrying outside to this task, the new mug would be placed alongside the old one while Ozpin continued to stare and ponder.

"Things will quickly slip past us if we let them." Contemplating, rubbing his chin, "I could probably use a shave…"


	11. Mesozoic: Triassic

**AN: GO BACK A CHAPTER, READ AN, OTHERWISE THIS WON'T MAKE SENSE AT ALL.**

 **As promised. In my opinion, better than the original. Mainly because there is actually story that follow this chapter and not just a black hole of endless suckiness.**

* * *

"How are you feeling?"

How she was feeling could not be expressed with her vocabulary. It being a novel experience, waking into a new body like walking into a new room and taking off the blindfold. Knowing it was hers, yet also knowing that something was different, perspective slanted. Between her memories and her current realty, she wondered which one was askew.

"Fine."

This answer sat true against the corners of her mind. She had her head if not her wherewithal, two legs, two arms, one hand and the other rapidly being put back into service.

"Good. Now, hold still while I remove the wrappings, okay?"

This she could do, well in practice after almost three whole days of doing nothing but. Sitting up or laying down didn't actually change things all that much, the pictures within the white plaster walls differed little from the punctured constellations in white ceiling panels.

Light humming from the nurse not all that different than the scratchy radio which lived next to her bedside.

"That's a nice song." Clutching onto the upbeat ragtime, a window with a view to orient herself. "What's it called?"

"Hm? Oh! Sorry, I don't mean to hum, it's just that I often get bored here by myself. Believe it or not, I don't often get visitors even though I'm on call every day. Students here always have to prove how tough they are, and that notion isn't easily banished by how quickly you seem to heal." The woman's deceptively frosty complexion quickly shattered, unleashing a floodwater of chatter that all but drowned Ruby. Although, she hardly minded, deprived of her usual sources of conversation.

"-My, you _**do**_ fix-up fast. From what I understood, I thought for sure that you'd be here at least a week." Fingers appropriately delicate to her image massaged Ruby's now exposed wrist, tracing a scar she didn't have. The ridged shell around it had been broken, yet she still felt as if there was something there. Days of having it encased had left a pale shadow haloing her arm.

-But no- this wasn't quite right. It was not a phantom sensation which surrounded her limb, but the wrinkled skin itself which felt unaccustomed. A casing of flesh for bone which begged to be free. Another indescribable sensation, an itch that one couldn't scratch without first peeling back muscle tensed in surprise.

"That's just the thing I find funny, though. No matter how quickly in and out my patients are, I always find myself busy. Too busy to remember things like lyrics, I'm afraid. -Loosen your wrist for me dear." Indeed, not pausing for her duties, the ever-flowing gab quickly plucked Ruby from this pit of thought. Tendons fell slack under the expert touch. "That's good. Won't take much rehab at all, not only do you heal quick, you heal well."

This was news even more pleasant than the soothing tune for which it had been swept aside. Now Ruby really relaxed, noticing details of her surrounding for the first time.

"Do you see things like this often Ms.-" Realizing she didn't know her caretaker's name, and finally noticing the tag which perched above the not-insignificant bosom practically shoved in her face. "-Um, Schwarzkopf?"

A springtime chuckle crackled, and for this along with the above reasons, Ruby blushed.

"Sorry, I get that reaction a lot. It's not much better, but you can call me Galya, or Galina, if you like."

"-Erm, okay. I'm really sorry, I…" Further mortified that she was the one being apologized to, Ruby wanted to fidget but couldn't under the current ministrations.

"It's just that it doesn't suit me, right? I understand that." Graceful smile taking it all in stride, she brushed back a sheaf of her silvery hair.

"No, It's-" She couldn't very well ask where the other nurse had gone to, the one with more scar than face- mainly because she didn't know his name _either._ "Uh, Are you from Atlas?"

"Good guess." Galya praised, hand moving upward instead of her gaze. Expert touch kneading out kinks and delicately probing around potential bone spurs. "It was the name that was assigned my family when we first immigrated, only three generations ago. Our lineage were vagrants without a real need for a last name. Despite this, Atlas was eager to have anyone other than Faunus willing to populate their cities, so they weren't very picky. They cut my grandfather a good deal on some land, secured a vocational education for him and his descendants. Silversmiths, nominally. Truthfully, only one step up from working in the mines like the poor Faunus families. It was still dirty, and even dangerous work. Hence the name. I remember my parents and even my grandparents coming back home with their hair slicked black, not a lick of pink to be seen on their faces until after they scrubbed it clean. All our clothes had to be scoured with stones."

It was inevitable that this stream of thought would run past rocky shoals, and Galya's churned and dipped in unrest.

"You're lucky, you know? It would have been so easy to lose this hand. Just a few fingers could have changed everything for a potential huntress such as yourself." Testing the response of each one, making sure that no nerves had been permanently damaged and making Ruby shiver in perturbance. "For as long as I knew him, my grandfather had only two on his left hand. From middle to pinky were fused together in a nasty web of scar tissue- molten metal will do that. Oh, he made it work, but it was never as good as having all five. Everything we build is designed around five fingers - _**we**_ are designed that way for a reason. Because of that, he could never play again."

Tone was light as her touch, both contained a nostalgia Ruby was compelled to empathize with, even if she knew she could not.

"I still remember how he used to hum though. And how he used to look at his guitar in the corner as it gathered dust. I figure that's what inspired me to become a nurse- actually, I wanted to become a doctor, but these metalworker's hands aren't quite up to the precision. Though we all make do, don't we? - there you are."

Uncannily, as if it had been scripted, she finished up without Ruby even noticing. Flexing her digits on her own, Galya gave another tight smile which accentuated her high cheekbones.

"Wow… thanks!" The true test would come in the next day or so when she would finally be united with _Crescent Rose_ , but the woman deserved every bit of her gushing praise.

"My pleasure. Sorry if I tend to babble on. As I said, it tends to get a little dull in here all alone. I never liked it up North, people tended to be a little too… cold."

"Not at all." Ruby shook her head, unbothered by both the winding story as well as the unapologetic play on words. "Is that why you left? Oops! -Sorry, I don't mean to pry…" The woman just made it so easy.

"Perhaps," Similar timbre as before, now Ruby was able to see her baby-blue eyes as they unfocused from the here and now. "Maybe that place held too many memories- or maybe it is the memory of my ancestors which holds me yet. Restlessness running through my blood and plaguing my eternal soul."

"I just hope that travel-bug doesn't cause you to disappear on us." A new voice entered her worldview, sliding through the vinyl curtain, stage-left. "I flinch to think of where we would find another such skilled medical technician. Especially after the last one skipped town without telling anyone."

"Not without giving my two-week's notice, I assure you." Galya wore nothing to betray a joke as she positioned herself against the newcomer. "How are you, Glynda? Need to schedule another massage?"

"Sadly, I doubt I will have the time in the days ahead." Her fellow blonde was equally serious, if not a twinge regretful. "Speaking of time, when did you check in this morning?"

"The usual." Succinct, without any trace of the previous excess. "5:00 AM on the dot. An hour before your usual, my dear."

Ruby was unsure if this was a common address between the two, because Glynda hardly even looked like she heard it, other than a distracted nod which she quickly turned in her direction.

"And was Ruby here when you arrived?"

Galya's eyebrow formed an inverted breve, and this accent conveyed more than her monotone response.

"She does not seem to be that prone to wanderlust, if that is what you are asking." Also turning towards Ruby as if expecting an answer, she instead continued to monologue. "Since you're checking in on the patient, you'll be happy to know that all Ms. Rose's injuries have healed up nicely. In fact, there's hardly anything to show for her incident and I was just about to discharge her. She should be good to go for the next time your class meets."

Glynda nodded stiffly, again seeming to ignore what was actually said in favor for what Ruby's inquisitive eyes were telling her.

"I am… glad to hear it." Halfway through, convincing herself that she meant it. "I have a feeling that things won't be getting any easier here on out for her, either."

Agreeing wholeheartedly with a nod that carried unknown weight, Ruby felt another such mass rest on her shoulder. Her eyes flickering to the side to see the increasingly accustomed smile of Galya which always seemed to strain at her sharp features.

"Well, time and the semester always march on, don't they? I assume that you have quite a bit to catch up on, best to head out then, my dear."

"Yo, Ruby! We've come to bail you out!"

Another such perfectly timed moment that she was compelled to play her part and leap into her sister's welcoming arms. But on the way out, she cast a glance back to the pale womb where she was reawakened. Though folded neatly back into the place she remembered belonging, Ruby couldn't shake the feeling that this comforting familiarity wouldn't last.

* * *

Four walls and a heavy darkness formed the place he had always known, accompanied only by a dogged loneliness to which he would never become accustomed. Everything else was the same as it had been for time immemorial. Change coming slow as the continents lurch towards the sea, if at all.

"~And with every tear that is lost from an eye,

"I'll dig me a well, where no man can destroy,~"

Pipes still dripping, crying murky tears into the ankle-deep well-water in which he lay. Unable to perceive the wetness, not even lucky enough to be numb as he felt the incision of every crack carved upon the stone walls. The darkness would not blot this pain out, fires sputtering low but refusing to ever be extinguished.

Why couldn't he just let go?

"Maa, what do you think?" Horse voice answering itself, echoing past the bars of a cage which no longer served any purpose. "What would happen if I let this place crumble? Think I'd go insane?"

A broad smile showing teeth like fangs, baring a memory of just such an expression, long-since lost to the world.

"-If I haven't already." Flipping to his feet in a crouch and not disturbing a drop of the pool. Looking past whatever evil continued to fester to see his stagnant reflection. Smile never changing. "Dunno… what do you think?"

" **You're already insane, boy** …true, true. Maybe I always have been." Standing straight and kicking the smiling picture of himself, banishing it if only for a second. Pretending, if only for a second.

" **Maybe nothing. The only thing you're more of is** _ **annoying**_ **, always prattling on and on about nothing…** well, excuse me if you know all my stories. Kind of hard to come up with something new to say when you're stuck in this place… **tell me about it…** I just did, dumbass… **You're the Baka!"**

No more capable of forgetting that distasteful visage than he was of destroying what little remained of the past. Countless names he had reverently inscribed into the walls and across ever stone. A world living in this mausoleum, in memory, in him.

And they would not grow old. Just as his own reflection never changed, remnant of the past.

" **I could help you forget, you know? If you would only remove this seal…** Remember when you were like that? Hah! Good times…" Miming to himself, laughing hollowly.

Dancing, singing, a perverse gaiety seized him and spun him around the room in a tizzy. Droplets of himself flying, refracted light gamboled through corners which knew only darkness.

"~And after a while, when my mouth ain't so dry

"I'll dance up a storm, sure life's looking fine!

"But as darkness falls, I'll return to my bed,

"Don't ask me more questions, don't _**FUCK**_ with my head! ~"

As quickly as the fit struck, it fled him again and everything returned to how it was. He had moved within the confines but was still stuck within that dark pit, his head bowed and resting against one of the great bars which made up the cell.

"~I want to believe in a freedom that's bold

"But all I remember is the freedom of old, hey… ~"

Pressed right up against the cage and it was just as cold as the rest of the room. Just as quiet, his hot breath wafting up past his face. And up, and up, and up. As high as the ceiling were the crimson bars to support it, pillar to buttress his mind.

" **Meh, freedom's not all that it's cracked up to be…** _Uso_ ¸ don't lie to me. That's the one thing you always wanted… **Perhaps. But bunking with you wasn't all bad. It was kind of fun, entertaining at least…** No need to make me feel better, Kurama. I just hope you're happy, wherever you are… **Funny thing. Where we're going always seems better than where we are. Grass always greener, and all that…** Oi, don't tell me you're regretting decision, Furball!... Hey, I'm talking to you, answer me!"

There was, of course, never anyone there to snark back. Far above, the paper lock fluttered uselessly against the paint which was always peeling.

" **You have to stop doing this to yourself, Naruto."**

He flinched, straightened to look at the wooden beam standing against his fist. The one which wouldn't break no matter how much he pounded it, the one which wouldn't bleed no matter how much he broke it.

"Yeah, I know." Striking it anyway, to feel the reverberation shimmying up his bones and the ripple lap at his ankles. "But it's a become a habit that's hard to break, _dattebayo_."

" **In exchange for the past, you're the one that's breaking."**

Slowly Naruto traced the path upwards until the red merged into black. Looking out at the horizon one cannot see the curvature of the world, looking up at the pillar was the same.

"Without me here to keep writing them, these names will disappear. They will perish." Turning around, he stared at the floor, the impossibly-perfect reflection read the letters the same backwards as forwards. His frown looked the same as a smile. "And without them, so will I. If that's what you want… if that's what you think I should do. Death would certainly be a change of pace…"

" **I want you to live."**

"Live, as you did? Heh, been there and done that. A smidge longer than you even! I might as well start calling this 'my' cage, neh?"

" **It is. This is your mind, and you are locking yourself in here because you can't face what waits for you outside. I never knew Uzumaki Naruto to be so cowardly. If you really desire to pay me and mine back for what we did, then live. I want to see the return of the brat who thought he could take on the world. I want the fool who tried to befriend a demon. I want the child who looked to a world locked away in anger and hate with a heart full of unlimited possibilities."**

"And just how should I do that?"

There was no way to answer this, seemingly no one left to speak up for the dead. And then-

"~I want to believe in myself once again,

"To dream of a man, who's hopes never end… ~"

With this declaration, meek at first and gaining momentum, he leapt at that pale reflection. Laying into it with illusory fists to try and punch a hole through the roof and underground.

It was useless. Strike after strike, time after time he had done this, raged against his own impotence, his cowardice, his failure. Fragments of the mind reforming wherever they shattered. And like every time before, he fell back into the swamp on his hands and knees, heavy breathing shaking his watery image but never the feeling.

"~ To kiss with a girl, who's as lovely as you~… I never even had a real kiss, you know that?"

He choked a laugh that given time could have easily become a sob.

"~ I'd give you my heart… if you gave me the truth… ~" Petering off into a bittersweet reminiscence.

"And… what is the truth? What does it really mean to be the Child of prophecy? To save the world or to doom it… when do I know which it is? When am I supposed to give up and realize that I'm the villain…?

"Why, why, WHY, WHY, WHY do I need to keep fighting?!" Burying his head in the water, he let out a muffled scream. There he would stay, never drowning, never finding answers. And never changing the grinning reflection.

"To live… life…" Never having a choice, finding himself back where he started, on his back and staring up at the ceiling with eyes firmly shut to his melancholic antics. "Life so close it's driving me mad! I want... I can't help it!"

Couldn't change anything. When he finally chose to open his eyes, it would still be the endless roof overhead. The dark shroud he knowingly pulled over himself so he couldn't see what had become of the world, all the good that had been undone, and all the good left to do. Wouldn't ever know that the sun also rose- only ever the blanketing dark.

"It's for the best. You've had your chance. A hero's path isn't yours… this life isn't yours… She's not…"

Unlike every time before, this time he opened his eyes to a night full of silver stars. Another dark pool like his own far overhead, two of them together revealing an infinite sea that stretched out in every direction. And in the center of it all, staring at him from the other side in a mirroring daze-

"-Ruby…"

* * *

The sun also rises. She knew this- as much as she knew anything, believing it with all her heart. To lesser degrees, believing that someday she would be strong enough, that she would be able to help her friend, that she would be able to help the world, if only a little bit.

Even this fact was hard to envision as they stood there in the dark of "oh-my-god-it's-early", during the changing of guards between moon and sun. Early morn in early Spring, every moment was a painful eternity, bitter shade of the woods robbing them of the little clouds of breath which wrinkled noses and chapped lips.

"Brrr! It's freakin' cold, right?" Classically underdressed with only her doeskin jacket keeping her arms from going numb, Yang made a snap glance around the circle while bouncing from toe to toe.

"Don't look at me." Lashing out in pride, Weiss averted her eyes even as she crossed her arms and shivered. Never to admit that Vale's damp cold was a different kind of chill than the sub-zero desert which was Atlas.

Being able to clearly see the puckered faces of her comrades did not exempt Blake from the same affliction, though she chose to keep silent and curl yet further in on herself to consolidate the heat.

"Well, maybe we should get started on our _warm_ ups?"

Not even a groan dignified Ruby's attempt to lighten the groggy mood. "Oh- come on! It's not that bad." Cold and pun both, her perspective limited within the warmth of her hood.

"Says the girl in the mobile blanket…"

"Jealous." Ruby shot a quick raspberry at her sister but pulled back almost immediately when ice crystals began to prickle her tongue.

"A little…" Yang admitted- far more than what the others probably understood. Extra meaning hidden behind chattering teeth. "Seriously though, what are we even doing out here this early?"

"It's the only time we don't have classes." Weiss answered pragmatically.

"Or detention."

"Yeah, but _**why**_."

"We all need to get stronger." Shifting her weight under the cloak, Ruby tried to ascertain how much of that commodity she'd lost. Flexing muscles and joints locked up in cold and stiffness. "We need to prepare."

"For what?"

-For the blade which reached out from the darkness and swept across the bridge of her nose, Yang's subconscious jerking her head back in time to perceive only the silvery flash as it whooshed by.

"-Oi! What the hell-?!"

"-For everything." Ruby finished as she reset herself across from their previous circle. "We have to be ready for any possibility, even the unexpected." Taking a moment to roll her healed wrist, not entirely disappointed with how it was functioning. "Oh, and you owe the swear jar when we get back!"

"Alright then," Sweeping out her back leg, Yang got into a fighting stance facing her sister. "You wanted warmups? Well, it's about to get _hot_ over h- hey!"

Still practically blind in the darkness, it was only the tremors of ground cracking under her feet which allowed the blonde to roll over her shoulder, backwards to safety as the pillar of ice uplifted under her feet.

"Seriously?! What, are you all just going to _Yang_ up on me now?"

"Just for that," Blake intoned, merging into the shadows and sweeping low towards her partner. "Yes."

Fully engaged by this time, both Yang and _Ember Celica_ lashed out. All but blind to the skulking Faunus, she smashed a fist into the ground which lit up a fiery ring of defense in all directions and illuminated the small glade. It was a snapshot that framed all members of team RWBY in a pose of action. Tiny fires that were ignited in the tree boughs were quickly extinguished by the sudden ferocity of combat.

But never the flames in their hearts, which burned bright apart from the darkness.

Birds move aside, and crickets cleared the stage for the sounds of battle which had long become routine. The woods' inhabitants were used to such events, and not even the Grimm stirred from their aimless migrations. There was no ill-will for them to sniff. For in between every clang and boom which blossomed and died in the woods, there was the cackle of laughter.

* * *

"Ha! Bet you weren't expecting THAT!"

Yang wheezed out her minor victory before joining her sister on the ground, neither of them in any shape for further battler let alone banter. Even if she had heard the boast, Ruby would first have to fight through the multiple images of everything to form a comeback.

"Weren't we… supposed to go… easy on her?" Not much better- in fact, probably a great deal worse since she had dropped out far earlier, Blake worried from her position far on the sidelines. Propped up against a claw-marked tree, she was still trying to catch her breath. "Y'know… hospital… and all?"

"Are you kidding?" Weiss really didn't know, because Blake's voice was even deader than average. That, and she was resting on the opposite side of the same tree and unwilling (unable) to turn around and check. "Did you see what she did to my dress?"

A rasping chuckle around her back said that Blake probably had.

"Hear that, Ruby?!" Again, truly unsure if the once red and black- now red, black and blue girl could hear her past the groaning. "You owe me! This wasn't cheap!"

"You still have energy to gripe," Saving up her breath, Yang had a snark at Weiss' expense. "'t's like cheating me out of a victory."

"It's called a tactical retreat." Weiss adjusted the remnants of her skirt to cover up more of her crossed leg. "Don't complain just because I did the smart thing and quit while I still had a _sliver_ of Aura."

"Oh yeah," Craning her head to see Weiss holding up the screen which was almost as blue as the sky had become, "I forgot we had those."

"Ugh! You're both so moronic!"

"I think… someone's just being a sore loser." Another screen popped around the tree to show Blake's bar well into the zero, replete with glaring red warnings that had been dutifully ignored.

"Traitor."

Silence. There could be no doubt, so regardless of her exhaustion, Blake slithered around the tree to confront a pair of blue eyes which stared back unamused.

-Then they both collapsed once again in laughter which split their sides and rubbed their throats raw.

It wasn't perfect. It probably hadn't even been a well-formed idea. And in this way, it was like all their others in that it ended up being something they undoubtably needed. Though the air between them still hadn't completely cleared, it was lightening like the sky to the point where they could begin to see the one another again.

"What's that, Ruby?" Train of laughter halted for a mumble that crawled its way from the girl's mouth.

"I s-d…" At some point shifting from her back to her side, now Ruby quavered on all fours- five if you counted _Crescent Rose_ which had found its way back to its master. "I… said…"

Watching through the valley of her cleavage as Ruby grew before her very eyes, Yang stood- _lay_ flabbergasted as her younger sibling shimmied her way up, gradually losing legs until she was standing on only two. No one cared how heavily she leaned on her scythe, nor how much her knees trembled.

"…I won."

"Heh," Head flopping back once more, Yang instead raised a hand. "I yield."

Weiss just shook her head. "Morons…" yet keeping her smile.

"That's us." Turning her surrender into a thumb's-up, "Couple of block heads. Runs in the family." Then letting it collapse against her chest, "Still though, can you believe boys actually solve their problems like this?"

"Please, never again."

Blake handily agreeing with this sentiment, social interactions suddenly not seeming so scary- not that she was in any shape for them as it was.

"Must be a different species."

"I am glad to see that all of you are keeping your humor about this."

If it had been the devil himself whispering over their shoulder, they wouldn't have had stirred.

Seeing as it was the headmaster of Beacon, they all immediately hopped to.

"Oops- careful there." Except for Ruby, who attempted an about-face, then all but collapsed into the arm that was quickly hooked under her shoulder. "I am also glad to see that you are taking to your training so studiously. Although, I would suggest not overdoing it in the future. -Not without supervision, at least. One never knows what lurks in these woods."

With a smile reminding them of his own mysterious entrance from the trees, Ozpin picked up their captain and set her down in the space between her two teammates, Blake and Weiss making sure their youngest stayed upright. From her resumed spot on the ground, Yang propped herself up on an elbow.

"Hey Professor. Hope we didn't wake you." The blonde putting as much cheek into her chagrin as she could bear, "What-uh, whatcha doing out here?"

"I would ask the same, but…" A silver eyebrow arched high over his glasses- over the catastrophe that was visible even in the peripheries.

"Um, right. About that…" Ozpin waved her off before she could offer some hastily created, though probably entertaining excuse.

"Like I said: I am heartened to see you all taking steps to ensure your future." Repositioning his cane for an extended talk, Ozpin folded his weathered hands on the clockwork pommel. "As for why I am out here on such a fine morning… well, I would be lying if I said that I did not expect to find your team absent from your dorm."

"-That's my fault." Again without their noticing, Ruby had regained her senses and was already halfway to her feet. Only kept seated by firm but gentle hands on both her shoulders. "I suggested that we have a spar to get back into form, and I take full responsibility."

"Doubtlessly." Quelling the girl with a gentle word and gentle hand, "I have come to understand that it is impossible to keep you from assuming other's burdens. Another reason I feel vindicated with my decision."

Given their recent exploits, team RWBY had no reason to feel confidence with this announcement.

"-Wait!" Prudence, energy, restraints be damned, Ruby clawed her way to her feet. "Please- Professor Ozpin, it's true. The other night- everything is my fault for not telling you sooner. If you're going to punish anyone, please let it be me."

"I'm afraid that's not possible." Still with that smile, same as anything, as reading an obituary. "Besides, whether it's a punishment is rather subjective."

Ozpin's hand made a swift retreat to his pocket, a flick of his wrist sending three objects which flashed with color in the rising sun. Three for each around the tree whose reflexes were not so dulled that they were unable to catch them.

And each stared at the speck in their hands knowing what it was, but unable to fathom what to make of it.

"-But you said…"

"-That I would be taking responsibility for their security." Possibly a trick of the changing light, but his smile almost seemed to broaden. "I hope this old man doesn't cramp your style too much."

Despite the seriousness, despite everything that had, could, and would go wrong, despite the literal and figurative voice of reason stating that this was an ill-advised idea, there were days that Ozpin truly enjoyed his job.

"Okay, I'll ask the obvious question," Grudgingly, Weiss took the duty for the rest of her team which was entranced by the spectacle, "Why?"

"For all the above reasons," Spoke the old man, who gingerly lowered himself to an even keel with his students, crossing his stiff legs and laying his cane horizontal on top of them. "And in case there was any doubt, I am not getting any younger. The purpose of this academy is to prepare new generations to take on the mantel as defenders of Remnant. This is not an empirical process though, and it was always up to you students to make the choices that would cause you to succeed. Just as it was you yourselves who formed this team, and you who decided to take the first step."

Though he was there on the ground with them, there had never been any doubt that Ozpin was on a different level. And though there was still no doubt to that skill, they for once could see the age which had begot this experience.

"This could also be said of those lives you hold in your hands. They were never mine to command, and instead chose you all. I would be foolish- not to mention a poor educator, if I denied those with the will to do good the opportunity to do so.

"Once again, though, this depends on you. Are all of you willing to put in the effort, bearing in mind you have only glimpsed the difficulties which await?"

Previous determination didn't vanish, though it was a great deal harder to maintain as the task solidified with the stones in their hands. Still, for some, the choice had already been made. And for others, there had never been any choice in the first place.

"May I ask where you are going, Ms. Xiao-Long?"

Walking away already, Yang was accosted by another non-question. Fist tensed, holding back her first non-response.

"Is there a reason I should be staying? Unless I'm totally wrong, you're going to help them with the Dust." Turning back to the group with an undeveloped smile that was painful to look at. "Three of them, four of us. I know you're getting old, Oz, but I thought you'd still be able to count."

"Yang!"

But Ozpin simply continued to smile placidly. In his job, not unused to this attitude, nor unexpectant of it.

"Well, it certainly has been a long time since I took a math class, but I think I remember a thing or two. Unless either have changed recently, I'm pretty sure teams have four members." The headmaster might have been the one uncomfortably talking over his shoulder, but it was the student who felt most awkward. "Am I to assume that you feel unable to benefit from my instruction?"

"No, I-!" Not nearly as good at defense as her sister's partner, Yang found herself at a distinct disadvantage to explain herself.

"I didn't think so. Though it is easy to give that impression. Someone less informed might also make the assumption that you are _abandoning_ your team because you yourself feel neglected." A truth that was hard to agree to when put in no uncertain terms. "-But I know better. You were merely pointing out an issue with numbers, correct?"

Exhausted before, now Yang was somewhere beyond that, without a will to protest.

"I thought so." Rising easy enough, Ozpin reached into his jacket pocket with a familiar motion and tossed something that Yang fumbled with in her surprise. "Problem solved."

"I don't understand…"

"Oh? You might not share your sister's Semblance, but I didn't think you were that slow…" The collective reactions seemed to amuse Ozpin and provide him with the suppression needed to make a retreat. "In any case, I shall let you take your time to get acquainted and reacquainted, not to mention cleaned up before class."

"Oh no!" Ruby shot up, showing more energy than she had in a while at this offhand remark. "We're not late again, are we?!"

"I think you have sufficient time." Cleaning up himself, Ozpin dusted off his trousers which still seemed perfectly spotless. "Speaking of: shall I count on seeing you all here tomorrow at the same time?"

It might not have been emphasized, but they all understood the significance of _"all"_. Looking amongst themselves- not _just_ themselves anymore, and not only the three additional souls.

It was not an empirical, rather, a human problem which confronted them. One which hadn't been entirely solved in the past 48 hours. One which would likely continue to accompany them on this journey they embarked upon… together.

"Better set your alarm, Old Man." With a toothy smile, Ruby brandished her fist with the spirit of her friend and partner inside. "'Cause you better believe we'll be here."

Ozpin smiled- truly smiled. The outcome had been predicted, but in no way did it disappoint.

"Somehow, I thought you might."

A nod which was directed to all of them signaled the headmaster's egress. No one made to stop him, because both parties obviously had a lot on their plate already. Consoled with the knowledge that things would come now in time. That the tapestry of lives would be mended, in time.

"Sooooo…" With procedure buried somewhere out there in the woods and classes still a way off, no one was really sure what should happen next. "What're we supposed to do now?"

"Introduce yourself." With a beleaguered shrug, Blake offered this advice as well as her hand to Weiss as the two shuffled on back to campus. "Have fun."

As captain and the one with the most experience, Yang looked to Ruby who nodded profoundly and watched on with concerning intensity.

"Ummm…" Between thumb and forefinger, the white marquise-cut gem appeared to glisten with anticipation, not helping things in the slightest. "Hi?"

' _Ha! Yes! Thank Kami- no, thank you Ozpin! I knew that there was a fellow man underneath that sterile academic! Sorry, sorry, to whom do I owe this unparalleled pleasure?'_

"Er, yeah…" Yang still felt quite silly talking to the stone, even after its words reverberated in a part of her brain she hadn't known she had- in fact, _especially_ after letting the thing's words bounce back and forth a few times. Not helping matters was the look her sister was giving, like a frog about to croak or a balloon about to burst. "Alright, I'm Yang. Yang Xiao-Long. What's y-"

' _ **I**_ _am the man who has no enemies in the North, South, East, nor West… I am one of the great Sanin, trained in the holy Mount Myoboku… Men tremble, and women fall at my feet- even babies stop crying when they gaze upon my magnificence! For I am the incredibly powerful and handsome… Jiraiya!'_

The reaction to this unexpected and unwarranted exuberance was silence… actually, it would have been silence if Ruby hadn't been choking on dirt and ripping out wads of grass to contain her laughter.

' _Damn! I knew it wouldn't have had the same effect without my super-sexy visage. Oh well, you, my new apprentice, will have to provide the sexiness for the both of us! Remember, I am counting on you! Together we will unlock the secrets of your body and expand your potential past your wildest expectations!'_

While Yang was not averse- and often the first to extoll her womanly features, there was something in the tone, a way which the voice poked and probed at her mind in _all the wrong ways_.

"Okay, well, nice to meet you, I guess. Look, don't take this the wrong way, but you might want to rethink your intro. I understand it's probably been a while, but it's a little… dated. Not to mention, it kinda-sorta makes you sound a little weird… like a pervert." Not to mention that she was increasingly skeptical whether this thing… person, ancient or not would be able to help her.

' _Perish the notion! The Gallant Jiraiya is not some common pervert!'_

"Ah, well thank god for that."

'… _I am a_ _ **Super-**_ _Pervert!'_

"Bwahahaha! Yes! He said it! He said it!"

…Maybe Blake and that 'Neat-she' guy she was always reading were right. No god would want anything to do with this mess.

* * *

It wasn't for altruism that the gods turned their backs on humanity. Ozpin knew fully well _why_ neither the Light nor the Dark would meddle in the affairs of man anymore. But the important takeaway from this knowledge was that half their earthly duties then fell to him. An avatar, a champion, a tool for beings that had nothing better to do than delight at their expense.

However, he had very little idea what to do with Jaune Arc. Some (most) had seen the boy as the butt of the joke, and his motivation prior to Beacon was indeed laughable. Not that the headmaster could afford much humor these days- worry, neither.

But, when he just so happened to cross paths with the boy on his way back to his castle, there was a certain obligation to stop and appraise the transformation.

The amount of perspiration collected by his threadbare sweatshirt spelled how long the boy had been out there on that cold morning. And wavering precision of his strikes spoke to how long he had been working on this form. Hours today, weeks, perhaps months. An exponential improvement over what had show up on Beacon's doorstep almost half a year ago- but never going further than this. Progress had stagnated.

Naturally, Ozpin knew _why_ this had happened. He was not unaware to what was happening in his back yard, nor his lunchroom. There was simply little he could do about it. For as long as Jaune continued to seek illumination from within, the option of asking Ozpin for help would not register on his radar.

Nor would the boy's redhead teammate, who was doing a pitiful job hiding herself on the opposite edge of the woods.

A quiet sigh was all the noise made as he restarted his path back to his long-postponed cocoa. His feet practically skated over the unthawed ground and his jägergrün suit disappeared into the trees, leaving nothing to show that he'd ever been there.

He wouldn't- couldn't worry. He'd given the boy the responsibility of leading a team, but Jaune ultimately held the responsibility for his self-centeredness. Perhaps there had been something that Ozpin could have done to prevent this situation- perhaps he should _still_ try to intervene. But he still had hope for the young Arc, for the lost soul trying to help them both find their way, and for the boy's team to understand what needed to be done.

There was, after all, a reason that Pyrrha was able to spy on a former assassin.

For better or worse, this would take care of itself.

' _Enough.'_

Unlike before, Jaune finished up his kata before heeding this command. Unlike before, he found himself not out of breath- a tad restless even, at being halted early.

" _It's not time already, is it?"_ Glancing at the sun instead of his scroll which he had still managed to leave behind in the dorm. _"Are you going to show me something new?"_

Somewhere along the line, fear had given way to normalcy and had in turn begot a twisted sense of admiration for this abusive personality. Even if he had been aware of Stockholm Syndrome, Jaune wouldn't have thought to question his newfound sense of purpose. It was something more than he'd had before, unwavering confidence disguised as unacceptable failure. Something was asked of him, and he was expected to do it.

' _No. There isn't a point.'_

-And just like that, it was gone.

"What _\- "what do you mean?"_ Catching himself, trying to, at least. But the bottom had already dropped out from underneath, ground he built upon never steady in the first place.

' _You're not getting any better, and you're not going to. There's only so much you can polish shit.'_

How it was phrased couldn't make what was being said any worse. Rejection was the same in any language, and something Jaune was already fluent in. Before this, before Beacon, it had been liberating. He wasn't afraid of it, he was nobody's puppet because of it- because he was already nobody. This lack of consequence allowed him to take those transcripts and pass them off as his own, he had nothing to lose if Ozpin found out his treachery.

Now he did- now he had. Finding acceptance made it easy for rejection to find him once more.

" _No, no, no! I- I'll try harder! I'll- I'll do better!"_

' _No, you won't. Maybe while the danger and dread hang over you, but it'll soon be forgotten. Then you'll get complacent like you have now, because you're nothing but trash and know it. You won't work hard because your life isn't worth it. Nothing I can do about that.'_

"B-But I will! I'll still fight!"

' _Against what? More of the Grimm pups that are dumb enough to wander on campus? The same three that you always spar against in that so-called 'combat class'? None of these will force you to improve. And I sure as hell can't._ _I don't have the fists to beat your scrawny ass into the ground, and I don't have the hands to show you how to wield that butter-knife and saucer. Shit, I knew I should have waited for the redhead Onna-bugeisha._

' _Whatever. Do what you want, so long as you fuck off. It's your life. I've got my own shit to worry about.'_

"Wait!"

Of course, Jaune was equally unable to make the consciousness heed his words. It vanished from his mind, but not truly. Neither of them were truly going anywhere, even when Jaune collapsed to his knees he was caught by the ground. And as he looked around the empty clearing, he realized there was nowhere for him to go.

The forest had become the prison of his mind. Grass, rock bottom.

It was only when the snarling voices found him that he discovered something else.

Anger.

Both drawn to this place unconsciously, Jaune stared up at the beady eyes of the Beowolves encircling him. _Just pups_ , foolhardy, stupid, eyes bigger than their stomachs which growled in dissatisfaction.

"Go away." Not getting up, he instead glared at them venomously- a humorous sight to everyone but the creatures themselves which wavered with brief hesitancy.

But, again, they were stupid.

"Did you hear me? I said go away!"

This shout ended up being the spur, but the creatures only had one direction anyway. And Jaune himself had no recourse, couldn't go backwards.

With a scream that would inspire no one, he sprung at the lead beast. _Crocea Mors_ slid through the roof of its gaping mouth almost without resistance and exactly like the form. The next stroke came easily as well as Jaune spun and sliced across another Grimm's face, forcing the wretched thing to its knees. Where then he should have focused on defense, Jaune stomped forward and finished the beast off with a stab through the back of its neck and spine.

As the creature unhurriedly dissolved around the hilt of his sword, the last of the triad pounced. Bounding off the back of its brother, the Beowulf knocked Jaune on his back and pried his weapon out of his grip. Jaune rolled a distance with the canid chasing its new chew toy. At least he still had his shield which he interposed between himself and the gnashing teeth which wished to snap him up like a tasty morsel.

His life flashed before his eyes, and nothing had changed. This thing could rip his throat out, and no one would shed a tear- least of all himself. Leveraging his new muscles, he threw the boney creature off him and slammed his shield into its face repeatedly.

He was stronger, but it still weighed the same.

Now Jaune was panting, done with his exercise, the Beowulf having disappeared long ago. Falling onto his "scrawny ass", he let the shield emblazoned with his family's symbol fall to the side- tossed it away in disgust.

The sun had no bearing as to how long he stayed there. Nor did the thought of classes which he was likely missing. Nothing seeming quite that important anymore, especially his life.

But he'd defended it, and the act couldn't be blamed solely on instinct. It was because he didn't want to be the damsel in distress, he wanted to be the knight in shining armor-

Not wearing his armor, the creatures' claws had done a number on his favorite sweatshirt, the Pumpkin Pete logo now all but unrecognizable. Surprising how he could still care about such a thing.

Shedding it like a skin, tearing off the black threads, sticky with sweat and blood. He was tired and struggled with this task, so that when he was finally free, he threw the remains in a pile on the ground angrily.

Then he stood there, alone in an undershirt that was little better off that the sweater- little better than Jaune himself, torn and yellow. And he would keep staring at the pile, even after he collected _Crocea Mors_ and his shield.

In that mound of black scraps lay the gemstone- the thing that started it all, now finished it. Once hidden within the seam of the hood, now glaring at him loose from the folds. And he hadn't a clue what to do with it, nor himself.

Blind faith made a terrible guide.

* * *

When the Beowolves had arrived Pyrrha had wanted to rush out and help. And then again, when Jaune sat there in his tatters looking ever so lost, she wanted to be by his side to help however she could, to be the pillar of support a partner and teammate was _supposed_ to be.

This hadn't been the first time Jaune took care of himself, so she resigned herself to the fact that the best way to help was to watch silently from the sidelines. Then, afterwards, to wander back to their dorm when the morning waxed and classes neared. Even this went against her instinct as she assumed more and more of Jaune's duties, acting as the leader to keep their team together. And worse, Nora and Ren were seemingly too willing to let her as the undisputed strongest among them.

Pyrrha was torn.

"What's the matter? Trouble in paradise?"

Pyrrha had been distracted, caught unawares- but not unprepared as the intruder figured out when a spearpoint reached out and tickled his jugular.

"Easy, easy! I'm unarmed!"

"Then that was foolish of you," She admonished with a bite that painted it as a threat, lowering _Miló_ nonetheless. "There are still Grimm this close to campus. What are you doing out here, Cardin?"

"Tch, like I need to tell you anything." And he didn't, but that spear-point was not as forgiving as its wielder and it still glared fresh in his mind. "What, a guy can't get a breath of fresh air?"

A reasonable excuse. For anyone else, Pyrrha might have left it at that. Despite vast evidence to the contrary, the champion forever liked to believe the best in people.

"If you spent half as much time practicing like Jaune instead of stalking him, you might actually win a fight."

Disguising his flinch with a sneer, Cardin himself probably didn't realize that his disdain was halfway directed inward.

"As if!" Trying to stand his ground but shifting uncomfortably under the gaze of his fellow redhead, "That loser couldn't actually stand up to me in a real fight. He got lucky! Ozpin and Goodwitch know it too, which is why they'll never let me face him in class."

This reaction shouldn't have been a surprise. The Winchester's campaign against JNPR's captain was well-known throughout the school, as the other team's leader hadn't done anything to make it a secret. Cardin was quite vocal about his unfair treatment, especially after the headmaster dutifully ignored his complaints.

"You wanna know why I'm out here so bloody early? I saw Ozpin headed to the woods from our window and thought that he was sneaking off to conspire with your captain. Since the " _headmaster"_ refuses to let me see him in the office, I thought I'd catch him when he was out and about." The contempt with which he pronounced the man's title was sacrilegious, but far more disturbing to Pyrrha was the passionate animosity enforced with every word. "See, I'm actually trying to do things the _right_ way. I've been following the stupid rules this whole time."

And wasn't that the kicker? Even his abuse of the Faunus girl, Velvet, fell within the loose regulations governing students outside of class. They were huntsmen and women in training, and certain amounts of 'roughhousing' was to be expected.

"-Meanwhile, you guys have been sneaking around at all hours. I wonder what sort of things you've been doing out here…?"

There was a delay before Pyrrha's face turned as crimson as her hair. But then it stayed there as she took a step forward and an emotion which she'd had little experience with flared upwards from her gut: anger.

"-Kidding! Kidding!" Always quicker with her actions than her mouth, Cardin saw the danger and beat her to the punch. "-Jeeze- look, I don't give a rat's ass what you do on your free time. You're too much of a goody-two-shoes to mess around, anyway. Blondie, on the other hand, I don't trust him, and neither should you."

"Jaune is a good person," Quelling the rage and whatever else had burbled up unwanted, Pyrrha reigned her reaction in with an iron fist. "Which is more than can be said about you."

"'Good person'? Please! You've just got a soft spot for him so that you ignore all his faults. When has he ever done anything for anyone else?"

She would have liked to defend her partner- perhaps she should have, but for the first time ever, Pyrrha found herself, her argument, weak.

"See? Jauney-boy's nothing but a leech- a cheat! I wouldn't be surprised if that weakling faked his way in here. You think I'm obsessed, a sore loser. But you'll see, I'm doing this for my team too. -Not just them, but for everyone that worked hard to get in here, including you."

"I'm perfectly capable of sticking up for myself, thank you." As she squared up against the bullish boy who was close to twice her weight, Pyrrha realized that she wasn't at all grateful. She realized she wanted to strike him, beat him, and that frightened her most of all "I will, however, also stick by my team. I suggest you do the same, instead of running around throwing wild accusations."

She might have been coming from a position of weakness, slimmer, a hair shorter, and with a blind argument, but Pyrrha herself carried so much weight with her name and record that Cardin was forced to back down.

"Whatever. Do what you want, it's a free country." Averting his eyes to the Alpha, Cardin turned to go. "No point in me sticking around, seems Ozpin's giving you guys the runaround too. I don't even understand what that man's supposed to do around here."

For everything that was wrong with him, Cardin did have some good points which were likely instilled from his political family. Whereas Pyrrha was a fighter, a person of passion who was admittedly of little use outside the battlefield- one reason she found sympathy with Jaune, and another reason she was not qualified to be their captain.

Were her passions blinding her to the truth?

* * *

 **So, yes. I will be adding a few OC's- Quit griping! I need them to carry the story because there just aren't RWBY characters with what I need- plus, just adding the Naruto characters changes things immensely. They're not going to be super powerful (are any of my characters, really?) and they won't become that much ingrained into the main cast.**

 **To note: Galya is short for Galina in Russian. Galena is a silvery mineral, and I'm pretending this is the etymology (it's not, but we're talking about a society in the future with only superficial ties to the past. It's perfectly legitimate that they would adopt and change our language). It's also sentimental to me, because my mom used to have penpals in the USSR, later Russian Federation, Misha & Galya. I got to stay at their apartment once, and I'll never forget the experience. **


	12. Mesozoic: Jurassic

**So, I'll mention this one more time, chapter 10 has been significantly edited, and chapter 11 is entirely new. If you haven't go back and read them, if you would be so kind.**

 **Oh, and if you could get back to me on them, maybe with some likes/ dislikes? I could really use some input. I won't beg, but I will ask nicely.**

 **On my knees. In tears.**

* * *

"Hey."

"Hey."

An echo.

Even if he were only this, it would be a first. Something besides the voice only contained within their heads, going nowhere.

But this was something else, something vastly more. Separate and unique, yet in the same time and the same place.

A conversation.

"I'm glad to have you back."

"Me too."

And, they were moving forward,

Together.

* * *

*Sniff*

As expected, his nose began to run the moment he stepped out of the cabin. Personally, he did not mind the cold, but his body seemed to think otherwise, and it rebelled at the first whiff of the desiccant northern wind.

In fact, he actually enjoyed the step out from the norm. This was a landscape that few seldom were able to see, and he had a prime view from the deck of the cargo ship. The scene was as clear as it ever was going to get with the early morning sun shooing away the mist. But even then, the Fox Islands appeared as little more than mountainous teeth which jutted unexpectedly from the sea, snow-capped points ready to swallow up anyone who happened to wander into their midst.

And this would be his home for the foreseeable future.

*Sniff*

Momentary relief as he took a sip from his travel mug and the warm, cardamom-scented grounds blossomed in his nasal-passages. Unlike his addicted colleague, he knew this was but a temporary fix. His stay on this frontier would last a good deal longer than this drink and he would have to once again get used to making do- probably with that horrid instant stuff.

Besides, a runny nose and bad coffee were the least of his worries. Nothing compared to the annoyance which awaited him at the bottom of the ramp.

*Sniff*

"Let's get this over with."

Though he'd rather be lost in the hills than deal with these self-important personalities, it wouldn't do to keep his welcome-party waiting.

"Welcome, welcome! We have been expecting you," Few in this world could claim to have had the esteemed Jacques Schnee stand on ceremony for them. Though truthfully, he did not care about this dubious honor. And he doubted anyone there really cared about him, either. "I take it you are Ozpin's man, Dr. Basayev, correct?"

"No."

There was an audible pause in which one could practically hear the incredulous stares. This was a far more gratifying sound than the droning rhetoric he would otherwise be subject to, and he milked it for all it was worth.

"No?"

"*Sniff* Nope, *Pop*" Relishing the moment, he popped the lid to his travel mug and took an extended sip while the pale-faced entourage tried to figure out just what the hell was going on. "I'm not a doctor."

Jacques' eye twitched as the seagulls guffawed in the background.

"But you _are_ Bruno Basayev, are you not?"

"Yes,"

Not-Doctor Basayev nodded morosely. Then, juggling his luggage and mug, he adjusted the thick glasses which had slipped down on his nose. With this action, he took a surreptitious look around at the other 'guests' to this venture.

The only one which stood out was another Schnee, and only because she also didn't look like she wanted to be here. Buried within the small crowd of adjuncts and sycophants, she tried to place herself as far away as possible from her father and the ceremony. However, there was no hiding the look of absolute contempt which stood out like a lighthouse from the fog. He would have spotted Lt. Winter Schnee even if he hadn't already known she was going to be here.

"Ah, no matter, I suppose in the Headmaster sent you, he must think that you have _some_ qualifications." Trying to recover his dignity, Jacques retracted the hand he extended for a shake and brushed the dew off his white jacket which looked like it had just come from the factory.

"One would hope, *Sniff*". He offered lackadaisically, not at all effected by the rebuff or the sneer. In truth, he was actually grateful that he didn't have to shake the man's hand and took this que to let his eyes wander once more to the scenery.

"Indeed," Though his guest was nothing more than a commoner- and an aloof one at that- Jacques had a reputation to uphold. Not to mention certain obligations. "Accommodations for you have already been set up, and I have asked both the foreman and the SDC representative to see to your every need. I am afraid that I myself will not be staying to oversee the mining operations, as I must preside over the head office in Atlas. I will be returning tomorrow, and it is unlikely that we will meet again."

"Do what you must. I require little, and I just hope that we can stay out of each other's hair." With a sidelong glance, he begged the man to end the charade and let them go their separate ways. There were no cameras here to please.

"Good. I am grateful to know that you seem to have things handled on your end." Jacques bristled but kept his composure. This was one of Ozpin's men, and the headmaster wasn't known to surround himself with fools. He would do as required, and Jacques just hoped that he didn't do _more_ than that. "I bid you good day, and good luck."

"Likewise."

Words were easy, and this session lasted less than he expected. What Bruno had trouble controlling were his actions, mouth peeling into a snide smirk as the SDC president turned on his heel and marched off to a private yacht moored in the same dock as the cargo vessel. Neither Jacques nor his entourage offered him a ride to wherever his lodgings were supposed to be, and the man himself did not so much as glance at his daughter as she passed him by to stand in front of Bruno.

No doubt Lt. Schnee noticed these facts but offered no pity to either of them.

"Dr.- _Mr._ Basayev," Observant of details, just like her file had said, not even stumbling over his last name. He halfway wondered if anyone had bothered doing research on him. "I'm Lt. Winter Schnee. I represent Atlas' military interests and will act as head of security for this project until I am relieved."

"Enchanted, *Sniff*," Behind the thick, brown-tinted lenses, he was still staring at the shrouded peaks but watched her reaction carefully. "You know who I am, and you can call me how you like. I doubt we'll be seeing much of each other as it is."

"Perhaps," She allowed, figuring that his job would be where the work is while she would be keeping an eye on the surface. "However, if that is the case, you won't mind if I offer you a ride? The camp's quite a hike from the shore."

Normally he'd prefer to walk, especially after being cramped up in the ship for nearly three days. But he found it hard to resist the sweeping arm which directed him towards a waiting military truck attended by a uniformed driver. Equally surprising, he found himself sitting next to the young Lieutenant in the back seat, rucksack at his feet and mug clamped between his thighs for lack of a cupholder in the utilitarian vehicle.

"Pardon me for asking," Now that she had him trapped, she did not bother hiding her skepticism, "But what are you exactly? Given that these islands are listed as a heritage site, I thought that Ozpin would be sending an archaeologist or historian. Yet the only publication of yours I can find was the senior thesis mentored by Bartholomew Ooblek."

Evidently, someone _had_ done some preparation. Rather than let it bother him, he rewarded her with full attention, turning away from the slatted armor windows and allowing a sly smile to crack across his rounded face.

"I guess you could call me… an advisor." Picking his words from far away, his unfocused gaze seemed to look through Winter.

"Your degree is in geology, is it not? We have enough of those from the SDC"

"True, though I haven't done much with it. I'm more of a jack-of-all trades and I've dabbled a bit into history on my own free time."

"Amidst a stint in Vale's Reserve Forces, I understand." Winter tried to recognize the look which crossed his face but found it as difficult to place as his age. If she hadn't read the dossier, he might have been anywhere from 15 to 30, and either happy or devastated.

"Mm. That was a… an interesting experience."

Somewhere on the bumpy road he had ceased to sniffle. The air in the car was warm even though he could tell the temperature was dropping outside while they climbed. Spring would not come to these parts for a while yet and so things would not happen until the frozen ground thawed. He'd likely be spending a lot of time until then hiding in the hills, away from this woman. He was no longer sure which of the Schnees he resented more.

"Sending such a man to oversee mining operations on an isolated archipelago, It makes me wonder just what Ozpin is expecting to find."

Taking off his coarsely-knitted wool beanie, he ran a hand through thick brown hair which hadn't seen a barber in a while- likely wouldn't, considering where they were headed. Another little worry that he preferred over the major one.

"Mr. Basayev?"

The heat was becoming almost stifling, and he again wondered why he agreed to this job. He knew a lot- had been told a lot about what he would find here. Everything except _what_ he would find.

"My lady, I'm sure I haven't the foggiest."

* * *

' _Ooblek's contact has arrived at the port on the First Tooth.'_

Looking up from her tablet, Glynda had to remind herself that no matter how hard she tried, there would be no face to greet her. A fact which made it difficult for her to discern whether or not this was good news.

"Did you have any trouble with the connections?" It also made it hard to remind herself she was talking to a person, not a stone. Its body was difficult to break, but not its ego. "Our signals can get pretty spotty up north, and there are no hardlines which go to the islands."

' _No, Ms. Goodwitch, Jiraiya's network isn't that difficult for me to manage.'_ Amidst her chagrin, Glynda also missed the dry humor in this remark. _'Speaking of which: you'll be pleased to know that this year's harvest predicts sufficient yields and the upcoming festival shouldn't have a significant effect on produce this winter. I have also updated the caterers to our modified grocery orders for accommodating the incoming student residents as well as notifying our kitchens to their foreign dietary requirements.'_

It wasn't often that the woman felt flustered, and she struggled to do so now. However, Glynda did have to admit that she had severely underestimated the capabilities of this being she had only met days ago, but who was eons older than herself.

"I apologize, Ms. Koharu. I didn't not mean to doubt your abilities."

' _Oh? And why shouldn't you?'_ Honestly not expecting this, Glynda looked to the ceiling and for the first time thought she could discern humor in that twinkling violet. _'You are a professional woman, Glynda. This is one of your strengths, and you shouldn't have to apologize for being thorough. Frankly, I am quite surprised myself that this old dog still has some tricks left in her.'_

The deputy headmistress provided a small smile that she imagined wouldn't look out of place on her mental image of the long-dead woman. Something told her that they probably would have gotten along- they would _still_ get along in this communal duty.

' _To be fair, that old pervert knew what he was doing and he left things in good order. A lesson for you Ms. Goodwitch: accept truth, no matter what the source. Jiraiya may act foolish- and he still clings to fairly naïve ideals, but that in itself doesn't make him a complete fool, nor an untrustworthy person. Just never let him hear that I said that.'_

Glynda nodded. While this was something that the woman thought she already knew, it was worth repeating. Many repetitions might eventually break the ingrained habit.

Amid the conversation she had been working on her own tablet and clacking away distractedly on the screen, but a word hooked her and dragged her away from her work.

"And Ooblek's colleague… is he a trustworthy person?"

From what she understood, the task he was chosen to preside over was critical to Ozpin's plans- which usually meant the whole of Remnant would be affected. Considering the gravity, Koharu weighed her words before speaking.

' _I'm afraid that is a question I cannot answer.'_ And it was easy to forget that these beings, while ancient and ingenious were not omniscient. _'I've never met the man, Ozpin's colleague's colleague… one's trustworthiness doesn't guarantee the other.'_

Nodding solemnly and clutching the tablet tighter to her chest, Glynda pointlessly debated whether she should have gone herself. Left this arguably equally critical post to trek up to the great northern wilderness on a mission that was still not entirely clear.

' _-I_ _ **can**_ _say though that his profile recommends him.'_

Unlike her living counterpart, a blink and a quizzical look was all that Koharu needed to tell that Glynda was listening. Perhaps too intensely, the file had not been an easy read, and she didn't want to worry the woman unnecessarily.

' _Skill-wise, perhaps, there were others who fit the bill. Qrow might have even been a better choice if he were not needed elsewhere, and his loyalty is unquestioned. However, unlike Jiraiya, I_ _ **would**_ _be willing to bet the man will complete his mission.'_

"That is good to hear." Though whether it was good, or right, remained to be seen. For now, Glynda purposefully did not dig too deep and chose to be reassured by what she knew to be a calculated bid. "I really don't know what we would do without you."

' _I daresay your lives would likely be a lot simpler.'_

* * *

The coffee had run out long ago, and the conversation before that. Thankfully, it wasn't as far as he predicted to their encampment. It came upon them suddenly, as soon as they passed an especially steep hairpin turn it congealed from the mist. By the base of the mountain there was a pre-fab city which was as dull gray as the stone but seemed starkly flimsy in comparison. Empty boxes forming rows forming grids like a circuit board under the foot of a giant.

"This is yours."

Well… at least he wouldn't get lost. His accommodations were at least twice as big as the others and smack-dab in the middle of the block. He fathomed they would have a hard time losing him, too. Undoubtedly this was the purpose, and he supposed the lavishness of the abode was to ingratiate him to Jacques Schnee.

He wanted to smirk again, but it instead came out a grimace as he tracked mud onto the pristine white carpeting. Clearly the man did not understand him. Not his values, not his loyalties, and not his purpose.

*Sniff*

To be fair, Jacques probably also failed to understand his own daughter, who looked just as awkward in the richness despite her uniform white practically melding into the scenery.

"Thank you," Carefully setting down his backpack on the albino leather couch, he regarded the rest of the grand room with the same sort of caution. "You were under no obligation to escort me. I believe I will be fine on my own from here."

In all honesty, the woman made him nervous with the way she seemed to command his situation even more so than Jacques, waltzing in on his heels uninvited. And while he suspected this didn't earn him any points in her favor, he'd sooner escape her scrutiny and try to avoid it for… at least six months? Something like that.

"It was no trouble." It was not hard to see her focused stare in the reflection of his dark glasses- even if he couldn't already feel it boring into his back. "I'd also like to believe that you won't be troubling me or my men in the foreseeable future."

Far blunter than her father, he had to remind himself that he appreciated this attitude because he still felt inclined to dislike the woman. She was too much like him.

"I promise that I will do my best."

"Very well, if there is a problem, you know where to find us."

There were no shortage of soldiers guarding the perimeter fence, and he imagined any one of them would lead him right to Lt. Schnee… if they caught him.

It was, after all, his choice.

This thought perking up his mood, he decided to explore the cavernous habitations more, starting with the kitchen. Quickly finding both pantry and fridge stocked, even with his nose like a constant sieve he sussed out a familiar spicy scent. Pulling down a vacuum-sealed brown package, he regarded the label over the bronze rim of his glasses.

"Ooh, that crafty bastard…"

Yes, he would choose to enjoy this.

* * *

"So," In the predawn gloom Ozpin regarded his latest project, mounds of cloth and flesh which resembled anthills. He was expected to mold these wretches into a symbol of hope for a complacent and disillusioned people. Shivers crawled on their surface like insects- like they already knew what a monumental task lay ahead. "Are we having fun yet?"

"S-so… c-cold…"

The whimper stuttered out from the mouth of one of the four nearly identical cloaked figures- Ozpin couldn't tell which, though he had a guess.

After the first few days, team RWBY had finally caught on to the fact that the mornings were slow to warm, and that a garment like their captain's was an optimal solution. Able to be shed quickly and covering their normal combat garb underneath, a woolen cloak or cape would keep them warm on these unusually damp and cold Spring days that Vale was experiencing.

-Or so the theory went.

"Oh, come on, it's not that bad." A repeat of the first day, except there were far more of them, and there was far more to do.

' _See? Ruby's got the right idea, so why don't you just let me get a little_ _ **closer**_ _to you and I'll warm you right up~'_

"Hah! An old fart like you could hardly warm the water for his oatmeal! Just go back to gumming your food, gramps."

' _My dear student, you'd be_ _ **amazed**_ _what can be done with only a tongue…'_

"Oh, I'm sure. How many women have you talked into being lesbians with your intro alone? -Or are you too senile to remember?"

' _Why Yang! You say that like it's a bad thing, but love knows no bounds! I can only laud my part in helping some beautiful soul find their happiness. And if ever you are curious about this path, know that you have your sensei's full support!'_

"What's that I hear? You're into the same-sex stuff? Well, if that's the case, I'm sure Blake's got a few books that you'd absolutely _love_ …"

At least no one was complaining about the cold anymore, hot blushes sprouting across almost everyone's face including Blake who was at that very moment trying to hide her interest in their conversation behind a book of unknown subject.

It had not been an easy transition… for anyone. In the thousand years he had been known to Remnant, no one had been able to curtail Jiraiya's personality. Truly nothing could stop the unstoppable Sanin, not death, not even Yang who tossed the stone into the stratosphere time and again when her rage boiled over. Somehow, he always found his way back. Eventually she learned to accept this fact after the third time a toad found its way into their dorm and spit up the gem on her bed.

Then everyone else suffered.

"Please make them stop…"

This must have been divine punishment for the first time she laughed at her sister. Because after that, the amusement quickly went away to be replaced by an endless repartee of filth and wisdom. All the worse for Ruby as she had the unfortunate luck to hear both sides of the conversation.

She'd already stopped bringing up the swear jar, it was full, anyways.

"Alright, Yang Jiraiya, I think that's enough. You can always pick up afterwards." Cool as a cucumber- but not cold, Ozpin regaled his students with a smile that almost made up for the dark. "I don't want to bore you too much, but before we begin with the practical there needs to be some understanding of the theory. By this point, all of you have either experienced the Dusts' power or born witness to it, and we are now ready to learn how to harness it."

"Yup! Been doing that since day one!" Ruby swelled, pride wrapping around her in a warm eddy.

"No, you haven't." Audibly deflating, the sound was enough to envision the comical letdown. But as stated, Ozpin didn't have much time for comedy nor interruptions. "That was all Naruto's power on his own, simply channeled through the medium of _Crescent Rose_. Only one of you here has succeeded in tapping into the primordial energy which is Chakra." Eyes glowing like an aurora landed on the blonde who was distracted by the insult-match still going on in her head. "Yang."

"Me?" Surprised tone not coming from only her. "…What did I do now?"

"Yang is the only one in the past millennia known to have channeled her Aura through Sentient Dust."

"Um, when? Oh- wait!" A flash of memory, bright orange and swirling, plowed through her mind. "It was that swirly-thing, right? Ring-gun? Rise-sen…something…? Hmmm… I _think_ it started with an 'R'."

' _Rasengan? The Idiot had you use that?'_

"Surely Yang couldn't have been the _only_ one in all that time." Weiss reasoned, trying not to sound bitter.

"As far as I know, she is. Well, the only one who didn't have to force the connection."

"Ha! Hear that?" Her team were right next to her so there was no reason to yell, but it wasn't them she was talking to. "Feel free to take a note on consent, pervert!"

' _Hey! That's not a laughing matter, and I'll have you know I never-'_

" **Ah** -hem" It hadn't occurred to Ruby until just then that, like her, Ozpin could actually hear all their Dust. But like Yang, she was corralled by Ozpin's insistent voice. "Whether she did it knowingly or not doesn't matter, what should be noted is that she channeled Aura through Them and not the other way around.

"Aura is not Dust, and vice versa. It is, however, an aspect of it: the spiritual. In this way, Aura is incomplete, less powerful than its predecessor and focused mainly on defense. We augment our strengths by using Dust to give us a physical boost. This is the other part to Chakra, and what makes it such a formidable tool."

"But if the two parts are Physical and Spiritual, and Dust crystals are themselves composed of Chakra, wouldn't that mean that using their power will consume it?" It started as a simple consideration for someone born to think of Dust as a commodity. But as Weiss followed the trail of logic, her eyes widened to drink in the darkness and she felt herself plunging over a steep cliff.

"Yes." There was no gasp, not even a whisper from the trees. "-But only if the spirit inside degrades too much. So long as there is a consciousness, the shell will return given time." Ozpin did sigh then in weariness coffee couldn't cure and power was but a temporary fix. "By now, there are very few left who retain this ability. This is why we currently view Dust as an expendable resource, since most have ceased being living anyway. Long ago, we could rely on Living Dust to power our cities, theoretically lasting nigh indefinitely."

Horrified silence had chased out the birdsongs along with the last chirping crickets, and even the Emerald Forest itself seemed to sink into the darkness the more this lesson went on. For who could be green with envy for this loss of innocence?

"But that's like-"

"Slavery, yes." Perhaps it wasn't a total silence, because Blake could hear herself flinch under the confines of darkness and her hood. "For better or worse, it did not last. When relegated to being nothing but a living battery year after year for decades, few could remember how to be people. And so, they returned to being nothing but dust.

"-But this is neither here nor there. If you want to know more about the anthropological aspects of Dust, I suggest asking Dr. Ooblek for his papers on the subject. I bring it up merely to reinforce the distinction between human and object, matter and soul.

"We don't know why they are able to regenerate, we don't even understand how they are trapped in this form in the first place. There are a great many things that we still do not know and if it is your wish you may someday pursue the answers. Today, however, is about surviving to get that far.

"I reiterate: do not try to use Chakra yourself, and only through the medium of your chosen partners. _**Because**_ we don't understand what happened to make Them this way, we don't know what could happen if too much were to become integrated in your body. -But it wouldn't be anything good, I can assure you."

Inspired by Ozpin's dire inflection the others might take this lesson to heart or they might not. But Ruby felt her own heart race, a frenetic throb which pulsed molten brine through her chest and down her arm where it coagulated, formed lattices which crackled again like glass, a sugar-rush the likes of which she'd never experienced before. So much energy her body couldn't contain it, and she felt a tad sick.

Then it was gone, departing from her chest and ending with soda bubbles being burped through her fingertips.

Regret, burbling up from deep within. An apology whispered against her chest.

But even if she heard these shameful thoughts that he whispered to himself underwater, she could say nothing as Ozpin continued.

"-The nearest analogy that I know you'd all understand would be like running lava through a garden hose. Spiritual Chakra, or the Yin, is much closer to our Aura. But it is still hard to completely separate the two, which is why I don't want you to even try. Generally speaking, if their former body was predisposed to the Spiritual nature, then most of their chakra won't be tied up in the crystalline shell and they can therefore use it more freely."

"Like with Shikamaru's shadows." When Blake whispered to herself, she did not expect anything but was instead rewarded by confirmation by both the devil himself and the headmaster.

' _More or less, yeah.'_

"This is correct." Being able to see Ozpin nod made them realize how much time had passed, and that none were shivering any longer. "From discussions I've had with Jiraiya and others, there is a minimum amount of Physical Chakra which yields the Dust shell, and any leftover can be used as a free agent without worry. Meaning the more Chakra they had in life, the more is available for our use."

"-But, if they were to use up all that Chakra, then anything more they draw on would take away from their physical form." Demonstrable rules made Weiss feel a little bit better, but it still felt horribly exploitative- cruel, to depend on someone knowing that every action potentially ate away at their very life.

' _And why should this be any different than you? All beings are mortal, all beings are dying at any given moment. Every action becomes a risk. A gamble, but a calculable one. Given this, given the alternative, why would we not wish to serve a purpose?'_

Weiss had no answer, and she did not even get the feeling that it was a rhetorical question.

"I suppose that's something we all have to consider. I am sure you four may have thought a little about it, but until you are subject to the job day after day, year after year, you won't understand what exactly it is. Huntresses and huntsmen save lives but give their own in exchange. Sometimes the life is forfeited all at once, sometimes bit by bit, but inevitably it happens. For many, the goal is simply to quit while they still have a piece that they can call themselves.

"I tell you this not to dissuade you, but because I believe that each of you is already committed and has enough life in you to weather the truth. You all came here for different reasons but came together because you share this same indelible aspect. I don't believe I am alone in thinking this, either. There are those all around you and next to you who have already expressed their faith in the most meaningful way possible, and it is in their best interests that you succeed."

Such a resolute expression of faith might have scared them- it probably should have, but something had also definitely changed since that time before. More than any physical strength and conditioning they might have put themselves through, minds and spirit had been hardened to the task and the truth which was often foul and long past ripe. The shit would rain down on their shoulders, and they would blossom.

"Right!" Yang slammed her fist in her hand, unknowingly giving her crystalline mentor traumatic flashbacks. "So, how do we do this?"

"Well, why don't we try to recreate the scene to see if you can't repeat the action? Anyone care to set the stage?"

A moment of confusion among the mortals in which a likeness of the dreadful Nevermore appeared. It congealed upwards from the lingering shadows and downward from the scattered rays of sunlight overhead to meet in their middle with all its terrifying infamy. It screeched at Yang with all the vitriol and spittle of that night- though thankfully lacking the stench.

' _Well? Can't let those youngsters outperform the masters, can we?'_

"Finally talking sense, I see."

As Yang stepped forward and rolled her neck in front of the illusory beast and her audience, she was unaware but her features sharpened- mainly just her beloved hair whose luxurious curls straightened into sharp needles to rival the barrage of feathered arrows. pointed at her.

"Heh, this is going to be easy!"

* * *

"Oh Roman, we made it so easy for you. It should have been such a simple job, like…" The easy way she paced the rundown apartment flat, such exquisite beauty having already lain claim to all the filth that she found it hard to find something to illustrate her point. "… taking candy from a baby."

A trite phrase coming from her lips made it sound novel, such was her control over speech, over her body, over the situation. She knew that even her casual presence was cause for mounting tension but did not fear it. That was a reaction for their subordinates, Roman's Lolita-like associate peeling back a snarl and her own bodyguards chomping at the bit.

But their bodies were also hers to control. With a subtle shrug of her shoulders she was able to heel her henchmen. And with a sultry sway of her hips, she was able to completely bypass the childlike woman and steal the icepack from Roman's hand.

"Great, if it's so easy, maybe next time you can do it yourself- and give that back! You're giving me enough of a headache as it is." Roman was quick to lunge for the cold relief, but she preferred to keep it a little while longer as illustration of her dominance while the criminal stewed in his chair.

"Now Roman, we hired you for a job, we even provided you with men, arms, and resources to do it. And yet you failed even take a few brightly colored stones from children."

It was to his credit that the career criminal didn't show his intimidation, even though she knew he was sweating underneath that neck-brace. Roman was not a brave man, and she was not a forgiving woman.

"Yeah, well, you apparently didn't give me enough. It wasn't a surprise when Junior's goons got trounced by little Red. Why should it be any more shocking that a pack of wild animals got their tails handed to them by her and her friends?"

"You're hardly better, you ungrateful mongrel-!"

It often amused her just how defensive the former street-urchin could be, especially considering how much of a whipped dog she was herself.

"Emerald…" A slight dip at the end of her name expressing displeasure and the green-haired girl slunk back into her immense shadow. "You're bold, Roman. That's something I always admired about you, constantly hitting above your weight class."

"We mortals do everything we can to survive, your highness."

"Oh, I am not the one you need to kowtow to, Roman. I am a servant, much like yourself, and _far_ more forgiving than my mistress."

"Oh, so this is where you're going to give me 'a chance to redeem myself'? How generous of you!" The man truly did amuse and impress her, and it was for that reason that she let the sarcasm slide. "I know what you're thinking- and you're right. I'm not a proud man, and I'll do what I need to survive. I also know this song and dance, and I can tell you it'll be the same shit-show as last time. That's what my instincts say, and they're seldom wrong. They're also telling me to get the hell outa dodge and lay low until this all blows over."

"And what makes you think that it will?" Giving him this, accompanied by a smile out of the corner of her mouth that could peel the yellowing paint. She continued to circle the room, waltzing by a dresser and running a claw of a finger over the printed wood, leaving a long scorch mark which continued to smolder with the smell of burnt epoxy.

"I'll let you in on a little secret, love. It **always** does." Neither bravado nor the neck brace could disguise Roman's gulp of nervousness as he interpreted the woman's words and found a sinister truth instead of merely hubris. "It always does. Take it from someone who's survived as long as I have in this business. Now if you please, I rented a non-smoking room and I'd like to get my deposit back."

It wasn't Roman's pith that killed the dire mood, but a derisive snort from the other bodyguard milling around in the background. While his boss squashed it with a withering glare, Roman was secretly grateful for the silver-haired teen and his seeming lack of common sense. If it weren't for him, he might have admitted that her tone, her absolute certainty filled him with an existential dread that he simply did not know how to deal with.

"-Though as it seems I'm going to be needing more cash to pay for some unforeseen expenses…" Coping in the usual way, with sarcasm to drown out the paranoid voice in the back of his head telling him to ignore the bruises and strained neck and just run for it. "… I _**might**_ be willing to give it another shot. -But you gotta give me something to work with. I've followed your plans so far and they haven't been very recommending, let me tell you. What sort of assurance do I have that this won't end up being another suicide mission?"

"My dear Roman, you should know that we'd never want anything bad to happen to you." As she circled around, Neo looked ready to make another futile attempt to block her from Roman but was stopped by a gesture from the crook himself. "We've already spent so much training you, it would be a terrible waste if we had to find a replacement."

Stiletto heels dug deep into the carpet which was matted with dirt as she unhurriedly approached Torchwick. Her fingers could have just as easily slid into his jugular as she leaned in and caressed his cheek. She wanted him to know this, and she could see the thought flicker past the defiance frozen in his green eyes. This would be melted away as her hot breath whispered in his ear.

"The end game is getting near. Try to survive until then."

Masks and positions were reset as she drew back and gave the redheaded man a condescending pat on the cheek.

"I know you'll do it. And you'll get what you need for the next act."

Leaving him with this, along with the ice-pack, she made her way to the entrance dragging her henchmen behind in an unassailable wake. Letting the flow carry them out the door first, she paused next to a nightstand that had been moved to allow room for the meeting. She set her hand on it, and something clinked down besides her polished nails.

"Let's not disappoint our patron, shall we?"

Roman wasn't looking at her, nor she at him. She exited his world after irreparably altering it, closing the door on a pathetic man who was so accustomed to the way things were that he would never survive in the new reality about to be ushered in.

"Was that really a good idea, giving those to him?"

Like something caught in the throat, the three immediately stopped in the middle of the hallway. Normally she tolerated Emerald's curiosity, but this edict had come from above her and so was without question.

The girl would be made to realize her error soon enough.

"The power they give him is nothing compared to the target now painted on his back." Without being harsh, the icy shoulder and cold tone was enough to tell Emerald that she had spoken out of turn. This was almost worse than whatever punishment awaited her when they got back.

"Roman knows he can't escape."

He was trapped. It wasn't just the decrepit motel that was crumbling around him, Roman had the feeling it was life as he knew it. And he was the one busy tearing it all down, with the rubble sealing his only way back. The further he went down this rabbit hole, the more unsure of the world he would end up in. Even if he survived to see the end, what would await him there?

In his experience, surprises were never good.

Lowering it from his black eye, he tossed away the ice-pack which had turned to lukewarm water in the hands of that woman. Locked in disgust, not caring where it landed and not moving from his hardbacked chair in the middle of the room, he sat there like he was on trial. He hated her, and he hated himself for being so subservient.

Not just her, but who she claimed to represent.

"Yeah, I know, Neo."

He strained to muster a smile where one should have come easy as his companion shuffled around to face him. His contentment with her presence was diminished by the objects she bore, unblemished red and white fitting perfectly into her cupped hands as she offered them on up to him. Without knowing what they were, one might have found this a perfect representation of their partnership. Their beauty was the kind that Neo deserved, the limitless potential and freedom as well. Those were the kind of things he wished he could give her.

But instead, he knew exactly what they were and what sort of burden had been presumed of them. -Yet another reason to resent that woman, yet another reason he should resent himself for dragging Neo into it.

"I know we've got to do something," There being two, it was only natural that he grabbed the red one. Even if there hadn't been an unnatural voice urging him to do so. Examining the Dust as he'd seen a thousand times before, knowing that within it was something immeasurably old and new to him all the same. Perhaps if he looked carefully, the answer that he needed would have been there all along as well.

"…but I still don't know what we're going to do."

* * *

' _Why don't you just tell them?'_

"Alright Blake, that was a good first try. Obviously the two of your natures are very similar so that potentially makes things easier. Why don't we see if you can't make your one shadow clone last a little longer before you try to make multiples or do anything else."

"Since Shika's helping, wouldn't it be a _Shadow_ -shadow clone?" Yang snarked.

' _She may be… obtuse, but she's not wrong.'_

Blake groaned but it was more in concentration, trying to drown out all the distractions including her own troubling thoughts which lingered like a venereal disease. Questions which became an itch to be scratched, the need flaring up at the most inopportune moments- like now, when she was trying to practice.

"Yang's inanity does make me wonder," Where Blake had her mouth and eyes clamped shut, Weiss was free to voice her own inquisition, "Just how do you know so much about Them, Headmaster?"

' _The man didn't build his castle on his own, that I can tell you. He had help.'_

"Despite his attitude on occasions," Not only Shikamaru's, not only her own, but now even Ozpin's voice pierced through her scrunched-up focus, light-hearted lilt worming its way through threads of measure. "Master Jiraiya is a veritable font of knowledge. I have relied on him throughout my tenure as a vital resource for information and invaluable opinion."

' _Bah! The spy game is too easy nowadays. Cameras, phones, social media- people are practically_ _ **giving**_ _information away!'_

"Huh," Weiss remarked while Ruby translated the expression, "I think I actually understood most of it this time. Wonder what that means?"

' _Probably that she actually_ _ **wants**_ _to hear what he has to say. That's usually the first step to listening, and the second step after speaking.'_

"DAMNIT!"

Slow to form and quick to tear apart, the clone that had been coagulating became visible to the onlookers just as it self-destructed. Its death was a violent exit compared to its inception, a muffled bang which tore apart spider-silk threads.

Blake's exerted panting was all that was left in its wake, the only thing to show that it had ever been there.

"I-I can't do it. Not now. I… I need a break."

"Alright," Admitting this easily enough, Ozpin looked not to his scroll but to the sundial of a branch on a particular tree. "It's earlier than normal, but I'm not sure we have time for any of you to go again. You do have enough to get clean and have a leisurely, well-deserved breakfast."

Aching bellies and bodies both lurched towards relief. All except for one.

"…Unless of course you'd prefer to discuss something?"

"Blake?" Not until their headmaster had said something did Ruby and the others realize that neither he nor their fourth had moved a muscle since being dismissed. In their earnest to collect their things and drag their bag of bones back to their nest, they had forgotten one of the most crucial pieces. "Is there something wrong?"

' _You know I can't speak up for you.'_

"No," Blake whispered to the patch of ground between her crossed legs. "You can just be troublesome until I do."

' _This is far less so, trust me.'_

And Blake did.

"Ozpin," Her voice cracked like dry leather. Soft, but unignorable to the man who continued to post sentinel. "What's to be done about the White Fang?"

"Hmm…" While Ozpin ruminated the others turned back and tuned in, physical issues as easily shrugged as the cold. "They obviously cannot be allowed to operate with impunity. Certainly, not so long as they remain allies of an enemy who is after the eradication of sentient life."

No uncertain terms caught Blake off guard, but it was the things which were impossible to voice that stuck in her throat. She had no solution to this problem, but too much desire to know what to do with.

"So… what will you do?" Fearing the frankness of an answer, simplifications by cutting off the limbs of the problem.

"That… I am still deciding."

"Then, will you let me-" The dawn light drew her eyes to her team which was framing the headmaster on either side. Or- maybe it was the shadows doing that. "-would you let _us_ give it a shot? I know that you're a smart man- a kind man, and you can understand the position they're in. They are not bad, just misguided. _**Very**_ misguided- and desperate. Frustrated. It might be conceited, but I feel like I'm the only person who can talk them out of this."

"…Because you're a Belladonna?"

A blunt question which was in fact a statement which in fact prickled Blake, causing her to flinch. It also spurred thoughts which had lain dormant for weeks now, a memory where she had heard that name once before.

"…What's a Belladonna?"

"They're the family which founded the White Fang." Ruby's whisper was swept away by the breathiness of Weiss's realization. "-The original White Fang created in Menagerie to be a peaceful reconciliation after the war. You're Ghira Belladonna's… daughter? Niece?"

"Daughter." Back to looking at the lonely patch of grass, Blake didn't see Weiss's nod.

"I see. I don't know why I didn't before."

With an eye cast behind to this flash of illumination, Ozpin waited to see if it would create a spark before he turned back to his original conversation.

"So? Do you think this heritage gives you some kind of special power as arbiter? Or perhaps the right to bypass law and forego common sense to battle injustice?"

"No- I just-"

' _Reasons are not always rational. Neither, may be the remedy to their grievances. You're not foolish, you understand that peaceful actions might not work. That's why it took you so long to realize that the path they are on now, the one Adam Taurus has led them to, will not end well. Though he is not entirely wrong, you worry that you might be. You paralyze to action because you are afraid of being painted the villain- or rather, worried about being so, and not accomplishing anything. You'd be best to let it go, to understand that humans never change and be content with the acceptance you've found here._

' _-But you can't do that, can you?'_

"I- Because I'm the only one who knows, who cares, and has the power to do something to help."

"No you're not." Done whispering, done tiptoeing around issues, Ruby voiced her assertion regardless of who was looking at her, heedless of being branded a fool. "Because we'll be right there with you!"

' _She may be… naïve. But-'_

"She's not wrong." Clearing her ear of a clod of dirt to better hear the mental conversation, Yang beamed a grin that was almost too brilliant in contrast to her muddied face. "Personally though, I think my sister's a little _acute_."

"As amusing as this is," And it really did seem as if Ozpin were trying to keep himself from smiling before he conjured up a list of dour possibilities to weigh down his poker face. "You all do realize that by involving yourself in this struggle, you're risking your careers, jail time, lives- not just your own, but the lives of your team, of your classmates, friends, family, the White Fang themselves, and those of innocent bystanders? And If I let you, knowing your intentions, I risk my own career, political power, this very school could fall out of my control, to say nothing of all the careful plans I have in place to guard all of Remnant. These are the stakes, and you would still believe that you have to 'do something to help'?"

Laying out realities like a grocery list, Blake realized just how poorly equipped she was- they all were. Their combined strength even with their newfound allies couldn't possibly hope to make a dent in the hunger for change that was sweeping across their world. This blatant truth made her want to return to anonymity, to crawl back in her hole and forget the issue, the school, the world as she pulled a stone over the entrance and blotted out the harsh light.

"…Yes. I do." Being yet in the light, looking up, she could see the agreement etched on all their faces. She heard-she _listened_ to the pleasant hums which voiced their support.

"… Well, okay then." An answer as simple as his intents, as the ghost of a smile. "So long as you understand the consequences. I will not deny that I've been looking for an alternate solution, short of calling in military aid. We also can't deny that you _do_ posses certain clout with your status."

Truth which had come in at a slant now hit them head on, but it was too dazzling for them not to be blinded by joy. Ozpin had given them facts such as they were, and they chose to ignore the conclusion that he had cherrypicked them all for his collection. They had all been chosen for their use to him, but _chose_ to be of use to Remnant.

"So… what does this mean? What're we going to do?" Blake slipped easily into the plurality, like it had been a skin waiting for her all along.

"I do have some ideas, but it would be best to first get some current information. I'm sure you have your own ways, so I ask that you make use of them now. It would still be best if you wait for my approval to make sure that there is a safety-net if something goes wrong. I will get back to you as soon as I can, say, in the next day or so."

"Ha! Yes!" Cheers both silent and vocal surrounded Weiss as she struggled to reconcile her implicit acceptance of this insanity. No- not insanity, because this was doing something new, with the promise of forethought thrown in on top.

"-But!" There always was though, and even the excitable Rose quickly settled down to hear the caveat. "…This does not preclude you of our training sessions. I still expect you to meet me here every day at the usual time." Ozpin's smile took on an air of mischievousness. "Think of it as an excuse not to stay out too late."

"-But-but- **every** day?!" Several grueling days had passed already and it was nearing the weekend. They had yet to take a break from either this or their de rigueur classwork. Apart from the dirt on their face, it was showing on their nerves.

"You all **did** choose this path, knowing the consequences of failure." Ruby sweated her outburst as the formerly tall man now seemed to double in height as he stared down at her. "Although…" As he seemed to be doing more often lately, Ozpin scratched his chin and banished the ominous air. "I suppose a day off might not be a bad idea. Perhaps Sunday?"

Four nods bobbed in sync as the team found themselves side by side opposing the would-be tyrant.

"Excellent! I'll see if Glynda would like to take over your supervision for that day. I must say, it would be nice to be able to sleep in for once, I haven't enjoyed my morning cocoa in quite some time. There is a distinct difference between morning and evening chocolate, you know…"

"Um… wait…"

"Wait? No, I don't think you can afford to do that. This conversation has taken up quite a lot of time already." Displaying willful ignorance, this time the man did whip out his scroll and hummed at the numbers he kept secret. "Oh yes, dear me. You best get going, you have only minutes…"

"Crud!"

Always quickest to react, Ruby gathered her teammates under a shroud larger than her cloak without stopping to think about what she was doing- because if she did, it might not have worked. It was as if time rewound, a sunrise of colors flashed, a crack like lightening, and the four girls were gone.

But time still marched forward, and Ozpin watched the numbers creep up past 8:31.

"…Only about thirty of them." He chuckled to himself, alone in the clearing. Sunlight finally crested the trees and fell on the sharply cut shoulders of his suit, causing them to slump.

"And time passes so quickly."

* * *

A refrain played which was the chorus of his life, rousing and reminding him that he wasn't dead- yet. Though he probably should have been, long ago. Dreamily he wondered if this tune would greet him in the afterlife, if he were not already staring into the face of absolution.

Without looking, without even hearing it, he silenced the alarm on his scroll and flung himself out of bed. It was the only way to do it. Despite what it may have looked like, he was not a morning person. A gaping yawn testified to this. He scratched his bare stomach, noting the loose flesh where there used to be hardened muscle and grumbled. Another reminder that the clock was still ticking, both his and the world's.

This in mind, he unconsciously grabbed his clothes laid out the night before and threw them on. One leg then the other, he patted down his pockets to see that everything he left in them was still there.

"~My breakfast was straight out of the medicine cabinet, remedy for the aftermath of my habits…~" Lyrics were whispered under his breath, quieter than the burner he switched on to boil water. Pausing, he thought for a second before grabbing a granola bar and shoving it in his jacket. "~Sometimes it's the ones that try to help that hurt the most…~"

Other rations and materials for the day had already been stashed in his daypack. But he rechecked this anyway, just to make sure. He hummed his checklist in place of the next couple of lines, both so often done that he could have done so while asleep.

"~I wanna hide away, in the back of a cave, on the top of a mountain where no one can hear me, and no one can see me, so I don't have to deal with them and they don't have to deal with me…~"

Intonation punctuated by a whistle, he lunged across the room at the kettle and quickly shut it off. Tossing the contents into the glass and capping it, he froze and watched the cheap, freeze-dried grounds soak and swell with a lustful eye as if he could wring out the flavor with sight alone.

He knew it was going to be damn cold out there. *Sniff*.

Too late to stop, though. He couldn't stop, because like a shark he'd drown if he did. The coffee would wait on him as he made his final checks.

"~So call me antisocial, call it masturbation, either way it's a solo operation, I'm just far more comfortable alone...~" Grabbing his weapon, he sheathed the bright yellow notebook and pencil into a leather pouch on a belt worn outside his sweater. It rested comfortably next to his Puukko, both hidden by the heavy coat.

"~'Cause people are ugly and people are hateful, destructive and greedy we're proud and ungrateful, the world would be so much better off without us…~"

Before a drop fell from the French Press he paused and blinked, as if registering what he was doing and saying for the first time. Steam was rising from the spout and clearing his mind still stuffed with sleep, with nightmares.

"Perhaps…" Without further comment he expertly upended the carafe into his travel mug, not spilling a drop. "Perhaps we're distracting ourselves to pretend we're not all just mistakes…

"Oh well," Bruno silently picked up his hand-knitted beanie whose tribal decorations flashed in the glow from the porchlight outside the door.

"…Time to go to work. *Sniff*"

Then he stepped out into the cold.

* * *

 **Lyrics: Misanthropic Drunken Loner by Days and Daze**

 **Previous chapter: Black Friday Rule by Flogging Molly.**


	13. Mesozoic: Cretaceous

**This is test, I can tell...**

* * *

' _Time does not just make fools. It also makes geniuses._

' _Time takes whatever there is and distills it to its base. Only the most fundamental aspects will survive this ultimate test. Desire, greed, hunger, lust, vengeance. A man will become what he most dreads because his fears are stronger than the things he holds dear._

' _Any imperfection is exposed under the scrutiny of time. If there is a crack in the defense, it will eventually crumble. A mistake in weft will propagate outwards until the cloth is ruined. Thoughtless words will delude generations who misinterpret and misunderstand the intent._

' _When all the pretense and uselessness is stripped away, this is true perfection. Time is the ultimate sculptor, removing everything that does not belong and leaving only the one, eternal masterpiece.'_

The perfect crimson dipyramid sat there in testament to this immutability, unmoving and unblinking in the darkness of backstage. Chaos fomented just under the surface, just beyond the velvet curtain. But it might as well have been a world apart, one rapidly fading into obsolescence.

"Fascinating." At last Roman blinked, breaking whatever spell he'd been under. "I'm still not letting you turn me into your puppet. _Not that I ain't one already…_ " There was no need to whisper as the cheering had become almost deafening, stained by an iron bloodlust that could be tasted in the stale air of the warehouse.

Besides, both of them already knew he was trapped.

"Hey, Torchwick, who the fuck you talkin' to?"

No doubt the brutish beast could see him clearly huddled in the back corner of the stage, but all Roman knew was the menacing silhouette with horns like the devil at his back.

"Just rehearsing some lines before the big debut. I'm sure even someone like you had to do some school plays back when you were a little calf- though maybe you never got any speaking roles. I never saw a school play with a speaking boulder."

Hot breath licked Roman's face from the man's snort, which also did little to oppose his bullish features.

"I doubt they'd let _**you**_ anywhere near a school, _**Scum**_." The White Fang's Lieutenant's mask did nothing to hide his sneer.

"Probably for the best, eh?

There was no reason for Torchwick to hide his cocky smile because there was no one who could guess the irony. Not even Cinder knew of his scheme, and it would stay that way until it was too late.

' _It is already too late. Your world is crumbling, and there is nothing you can do about it.'_

"I'll take that under advisement…" Grumbling at the one person who _did_ know, Roman pulled his bowler at a jaunty tilt at the same time he slipped the crystal into the hat band.

"Quit dragging, you're up!" The big Faunus practically pulled him into the spotlight with his gravity.

"Right now though, it's showtime!"

* * *

"Setting the stage, huh? Still… that's a lot of explosives… *Sniff*."

There was no need for Winter to acknowledge this remark, doing so would be to show weakness. She'd have to admit that she'd been otherwise unable to find him in his lodgings or elsewhere. Besides, there was no need. The obnoxious sniffle was all she needed to hear to picture that ruddy face partly shrouded by fragrant vapor.

"The upper soil is still frozen, and beneath that is nothing but pure granite. I suppose it **would** take a lot if they want to get started right away." Though it sounded like an idle comment, there was something at last to prompt a response from Winter.

"Dust is a critical part of our existence." She stated mechanically as she watched the pallets of plastic charge be lowered via a winch onto a waiting flatbed truck. "The thickness of the rock won't change in a matter of weeks, so there is no sense in wasting time."

"I guess not."

Even though she knew it was coming in the long pause leading up to it, the prolonged sip still grated on her nerves and she matched it with an equally long-suffering sigh.

"Alright. I'll bite. Why are you here? Surely this isn't the only interesting thing on this island."

She was only there because she was head of security, and there was enough non-dust propellant there to level a town like Patch. And despite his quirks, she didn't take this man Basayev as a pyromaniac.

"It's one of life's great mysteries, isn't it?" Instead of running for the hills, he took the low road. "Why are we here? I mean, are we the product of some cosmic coincidence, or is there really a God watching everything?"

Though he had been steadily becoming acclimated to the cold, the icy gaze Winter shot over her shoulder could have frozen the scalding drink in his hands. He really didn't want to offend the woman any more than he already had, so he answered as truthfully as he could.

"…*Sniff* I'm waiting. I was hoping that Dr. Ooblek would send me some supplies I requested. But so far all I see is piles of Hexogen."

"What kind of supplies?" Asking cautiously, as if she might scare him away after finally coaxing an answer out of the cracks.

"Books mainly. Have to do something while I'm waiting." Not wanting to seem guarded himself, Bruno shot back a quick gulp from his mug. After that, he once more had to fight his rebelling body as it tried to divert the awful stuff from his stomach to his lungs. "*Cough, Cough*-And maybe- *Cough* some coffee that doesn't try to kill me!"

Winter smirked at him, though not necessarily in a cruel way. It was the expression one gave a green recruit who was just beginning to appreciate 'the Suck' that everyone else had to go through. It was commiseration, and it was a start.

"Um, Mr. Basayev?" The call was almost lost amidst the shouts tossed back and forth from the docks to the deck of the ship. A box trundled towards them on two spindly legs, blindly weaving in and out of heavy machinery working all around. "I think this package is for you. It's -uh- it's from a Mr. Ozpin…"

Without a word but with a gleefulness she'd not seen on anyone since arriving, Basayev practically skipped towards the overwhelmed courier as if it were Christmas morn. The warning labels on the box declaring: "Fragile" were but festive decorations, and the two antlers on the boy's waiflike frame only added to the illusion.

"Here, here, let me help you with tha-"

Before he could reach the Faunus deckhand, before he could even complete the thought, there was a crack which pierced the busy din and the young lad spilled forward. As ancient as it was, the dock's rotten planks had given way under the strain and the boy's feet, and he crashed through the splinters.

It all happened quicker than anyone could react, the lad himself only having time for a plaintiff squeak. Faster than this, Bruno lunged at the precious cargo before it could hit the ground, as if the unassuming cardboard contained the real explosives and not the reinforced pallets stacked up behind.

Book spines cracked with a horribly dull thrum against the wooden docks as they spilled forth from the ruined cardboard. There was a moment when the whole world seemed to pause, and one could listen to the laments of a peaceful morning which sounded like pages flapping in the breeze.

"You alright?" Not a large man by any means, one of Basayev's arms almost fully encircled the boy's waist as he held him above the jagged pit. Even then, it was a little awkward with just how gangly the lad was and how Bruno had to spread his legs wide over the hole.

"Easy now," Carelessly tossing his mug to the side, he twisted around and scooped the now free arm underneath the Faunus' legs, maneuvering them around the wood fragmented like punji traps. He wanted to set the boy down on his own, but his shaking legs didn't seem to want to support him.

"I-I'm sorry! I'm so, so sorry!" Grasping the nearby railing, the Faunus boy looked at the mess and felt the bottom drop out underneath him once again. There was no way he wasn't getting beaten for this mistake.

"Are you bleeding?" But Basayev seemed to ignore it, at least until he made sure there were no obvious gaffs or gashes on the boy's bare legs. Only when this was done did he dare assess the damage.

"Don't worry kid. They're only books," Even when saying this, he looked upon the scattered pile dejectedly. Gilded covers had been torn and velum pages bent at horrid angles in this death assemblage, and he grieved silently for these clearly ancient texts. "They're only books…"

The rest of the world picked up as Bruno shuffled over to do the same for the pile of texts, ignoring the stares and even the continued moaning from the Faunus boy. The box was patched up with a ruthless application of duct tape, but the books were placed back one by one with a certain reverence. It would clearly take a while, but Basayev wasn't about to move even as the dock workers swam around him in their haste.

Before she knew what she was doing, Winter was helping him. Maybe as penance for being too slow, though it could have also been an opportunity to see what the man considered so important.

It wasn't her eyes but her feelings which stopped upon a certain volume.

"This is a dead language," And that was all she knew about the tome in her hands. She had paused when she saw the sweeping pictograms embossed on the cover and spread throughout the entire text. "You know how to read it?"

"A little." He held out his arm expectantly, and she realized that it was the last one. "Just enough to be dangerous."

With both their hands on the volume she looked at him, seeing no trace of the teasing smile before.

"…No coffee?"

One corner of his mouth twisted wryly, and he traded her the book for a vacuum-sealed brown package which Winter found much more interesting and understandable.

"This is a Central Vacuo Blend." Winter stated almost astounded, as if she were holding something of equal value. "You can't use it in a regular machine, can you?"

"Nope,"

"I'm afraid it will do me little good then, seeing as we don't have anything else in the barracks."

"In that case," As Basayev squatted to pick up the repaired box, she tossed the package on top before he could fully stand. "Stop by some time and I'll show you how to brew it. I suppose I owe you a cup."

"You'd have to tell me where you've been staying, since no one's seen you at your lodgings since the first day."

"Traded it for one near the edge. I don't like big spaces, they make me feel uncomfortable." Where the conversation was headed did too, and he started to walk away.

"They're easier to defend as well." With her significantly longer legs, all it took was a few strides to catch up to his admittedly quick pace. "You'll have to show me which one it is on the ride back." He stopped, and though she couldn't see his face because of the cardboard, he was easy enough to read. "…Unless you prefer to walk all the way back with that box."

He almost did. Having paced it out on the way down, he knew he could probably do it, but…

"…I'm really hoping this doesn't become a routine. I don't like owing favors."

"You won't, depending on how good the coffee is." With one victory under her belt, Winter smugly headed to where she had parked earlier, leaving Bruno to stew.

And when mulling things over, he turned to look at the piles of boxes which were being moved almost as soon as they had been unloaded. Seeing the incident earlier, now no one trusted the dock's integrity and people scrambled to get them on shore or into the caravan of trucks which raced back and forth up the winding dirt road.

"…That's a lot of explosives." Despite their efforts, the pile hardly seemed to go down and the ship bobbed on the ocean in weightlessness.

"… I'm sure they won't miss a little bit."

* * *

There was a buzz in her pocket and she abruptly stopped in the middle of the hallway. Pulse on her thigh so much like the straining of muscles that she might have missed it, except that she had been expecting the message. She ducked under an archway to answer it, heedless of the students who eyed her questionably on their way to class. Her own would be waiting for her.

It was from Koharu. She was still locked in the tower, but could reach out anywhere there was a cellular signal.

' _Update from Basayev. He writes: "I appreciate the books, they answered some of my questions. Though with all the fog, it is still difficult to see the forest through the trees. Tell the Doctor thanks for the coffee, not sure how much time I'll have to enjoy it."'_

The message was meant for Ozpin, but she understood it well enough to pass on the distilled version. The headmaster was too busy preparing. It was going to be another long night.

She sent out a quick confirmation and looked up at the sun streaming through one of the windows high overhead. It had started as such a nice morning.

"Goodwitch!"

It never surprised her how quickly it could be turned.

"Mr. Winchester. You are supposed to be in class." If only this issue could also be dealt with remotely, or delegated, outsourced to a faraway land. But she was where the buck stopped. "A student is expected to demonstrate patience. I had to respond to an important message and will be there in just a minute."

"Patience?!" The redhead stormed, stomping up to the teacher but feeling the wind leave his sails halfway there, robbed by the emptiness of Glynda's stare. "I've been patient for months now! Every time I try to talk to either you or Ozpin I keep getting put off for 'something more important'. You wanna tell me that's what this is too?!"

"Yes." Glynda stated unwavering. "I'm sorry if I don't have much time for a teenager who got his feelings hurt."

"He **stabbed** me!"

"-And you healed. Both your punishments have been served. You are a huntsman in training. As far as the school is concerned, the matter is dropped. Grudges or vendettas, however, are not tolerated and are marked on the record for mental unsuitability."

"Me! The psycho?! I seem to be the only sane one here!"

"Do your teammates agree with this consensus?"

"No, but my _father_ does!"

Where most professional huntsman would regard this threat and cower in fear of the infamous politician, Glynda was not so easily intimidated. Slight and fair as a child, she had grown into a fearsome woman who would never be bullied by man or beast. Though what made her indispensable and inescapable as Ozpin's right hand wasn't so much her prowess on the battlefield as it was the courtroom. Her nature to be direct was only outdone by her propensity for organization and regulation, a combination which made her a formidable political opponent. Ozpin confessed after an especially demoralizing defeat at poker that she could be running Beacon if she so desired.

That said, she really didn't want to deal with this.

"Fine. We're talking now. What is it you want? Make it quick, we both have class."

"Expel Jaune."

"No." Flat out in so blunt a voice that Cardin would have been knocked off his feet if he hadn't been leaning forward in earnest. "Unless there is an unignorable problem, only the Headmaster can make that decision and you will _not_ bother him with this."

"There _**is**_ a problem! Jaune's fucking nuts, always talking to himself when he thinks no one's looking. And he's out there every day killing himself with exercise- I've seen it! It's only a matter of time before he thinks to kill one of _us_."

"This is nonsense." Pretending they were talking about a different student made the declaration easier. Glynda held her own misgivings about the Headmaster's choice with the Arc boy but would stand by them, knowing the truth to the matter. "Mr. Arc has fought against all your teammates without issue. Your fears are unjustified, and you are wasting both our times."

"No-! I-"

"-If the next words out of your mouth are without merit, I will have you spend the next month with Dr. Ooblek learning how to cite your sources."

Cardin's mouth would not have clamped neither so firmly nor so fast if Glynda herself had closed it with her Semblance. His face twisted and contorted as it chewed through thoughts thick with vitriol, at last daring to open when he'd shoved most of the volatile emotions to the back of his throat.

"Let me fight him."

"Excuse me?"

"In class, with you proctoring. Let me fight him, and I'll prove it to you."

Doing well to hide it from his peers and even himself, never would Cardin admit that he was now slightly phobic of that weakling. But it wouldn't hurt to have someone like Glynda watching while he extracted some well-deserved justice, just in case.

"Fine."

"Fine?"

"Fine," Rolling her eyes, Glynda reminded her pupil that she was never under any pressure as she easily pushed past his hulking mass. "I was only keeping you two apart because you seemed so shaken up after the incident. If you want to spar against Jaune, all you had to do was ask."

Somehow this acceptance proved worse than further denial, an abrupt stop, flat against a wall of his own making. All he had to do was turn around and look at himself, but the only thing which shifted was lingering anger as it churned and roiled in his stomach, boiling his blood and hiding the truth behind a smokescreen of hate.

"Don't be late to class." Glynda called from down the hallway, already opening the door to the arena.

* * *

"Do we have any volunteers for the next round?"

A shallow nod acknowledged Cardin's bid, coming just shortly after his hand and before his body leapt out of the seat towards the locker room. Hardly anyone noticed his acceptance, let alone eagerness. The students were either busy gabbing amongst themselves or had their eyes glued up in expectant routine.

Glynda, meanwhile, kept glancing between her tablet and the stands in indecision. She was unsure if she should placate the captain of team CRDL or teach him a lesson in rank. This was an Ozpin type of issue, and one reason she had turned him down that drunken night.

It was Pyrrha who made the decision for her.

"Mr. Arc."

The hand which she had been raising quickly fell, dragging down a pall of silence in the room. Everyone was either looking at Jaune or trying to understand the catalyst for the sudden shift in atmosphere.

"Mr. Arc?" Everyone but Jaune himself who seemed blind to it all. "Jaune Arc!"

"Huh?" Jaune sat up, blinking the fog out of his eyes and instantly seemed to become aware of the situation as if it was happening to someone else. "Uh, right."

As Jaune passed on his way to the locker room, Glynda caught his arm, "Focus on your fight, Jaune. And nothing else."

He nodded stiffly but it did little to ease her conscience, not least because she had also managed to catch his partner's eye which continued to hold her as they waited for the combatants to return.

"Are the fighters ready?"

Clear that Jaune was not despite his polished armor, and that Cardin was much too antsy with the handle of his mace twisting in his grip. It was an imbalance, but the only way for things to move forward.

"Begin!"

There was no voice barking at Jaune to tell him to get out of the way of the fast approaching danger, so he would have to make do with his own which sounded feeble, more like a suggestion. It would soon be overcome by Cardin's quaking blow as it hammered into the ground next to his feet.

" _Let's see… A one on one, direct fight. No chance for a sneak attack. He's bigger than me, but he's also sloppy."_ Thoughts plucked from somewhere else were transplanted into his head as he did like Glynda said and concentrated on nothing else but the fight. _"You can still do this, Jaune. You must."_

The second strike Cardin missed was his opportunity. Feeling no more afraid of the spiked weapon than the teeth of a Beowulf, he ducked and lunged at the gap in his opponent's armor exposed by the extended swing. A foreign voice whispered to him coldly, telling him to make his blow count. It guided his hand to that fleshy part under the arm leading directly to the heart.

*Clang!*

The thought came to him too slow. Cardin dropped his elbow and knocked the blow off course, forcing Jaune to skate back and throw up his shield against a hastily formed follow-on thrust. It still rattled his bones and settled him into the reality in which he hadn't practiced any with his shield. He needed to reset, to regain distance and thus his advantage, but Cardin wasn't going to let him.

It wasn't a Beowulf he was fighting, but it might as well be with the way the other team leader kept on with his berserk onslaught. Theoretically all it would take would be another wild attack- of which there seemed to be plenty. But first he had to get out of the corner he found himself in.

Weathering another blow uncomfortably on his shield, Jaune then used it to check past the older boy which only worked because Cardin was systematically unbalanced. Not dwelling on this depreciating thought or the back foot for long, Jaune spun and slashed at the other teen's lumbar and watched him stumble. Forced to curse himself, Jaune knew he should have aimed for the bared hamstring instead of the armored torso.

But neither were stopping much to think, which was probably for the best. If he did, Jaune might have realized he was still scared. No matter how common they were or weak they seemed, a Beowulf was a fearsome beast and would always be in his mind. Every step he took in this new life scared him, but he had learned to ignore this voice in favor of the one urging him onwards, commanding that next strike.

He danced out of the way of another sloppy strike but seemed unable to capitalize on it besides a quick peck at the other boy's armor. There was nothing driving his own attacks and they came out weak. He could see that Cardin was angry, and he tried to use that energy. Cardin was a bully, but not his bully. Just another person who wanted to hammer him down a peg or two.

Jaune's real bully was inside, as was the real fight.

" _Come on! He's practically handing this fight to you, why can't you do anything?!"_

The weight of his shield was holding back his full mobility with _Crocea Mors_ , but he daren't drop it for being without something to put between him and the brute. He could practically hear the chants of cowardice but didn't care about them. Snickers of ineptitude however…

"Grraah!"

Guttural cry in place of derision as he heaved the blow once more against Jaune's shield. It was clear Cardin was becoming more frustrated with each passing moment, just as much as Jaune was. As if this match were not a simple spar, just as scared of losing.

When this comparison blinked through his head, Jaune paused- to his detriment as Cardin swung another heavy two-handed blow at his side, not even trying to avoid Jaune's shield but plowing through it. It worked, as his already numb arm wormed its way out of the leather strap without his notice. Jaune's attention was elsewhere on his opponent.

" _He's… scared?"_

Fighting most ferociously when there was no other option, human choice always came down to the dichotomy of fight or flight. Jaune and Cardin were the same in this respect, just two sides of the same, grimy coin.

" _We're both pathetic."_

Accepting this, moments before the metal wrecking ball splattered his brains, Jaune dropped under the mad swing and imbued his own rage into a horizontal slash. No one had expected the power behind the strike which bruised more than Cardin's ego as the blunt force reverberated under his armor. Quantified on the screen above them, Cardin's Aura dropped a few decimals beside Jaune's.

Both arms balanced in ache, Jaune collected his shield and charged at the other boy who was still trying to collect himself.

" _Then… what's really the difference?"_

From that point on the fight was visibly even. Jaune was faster than he had been- stronger too, no one would deny. There was still a sense that he was struggling to control his body as Cardin was struggling to control his emotions. That, and while the training had unequivocally paid off, Jaune was still less robust. He had more Aura, but Cardin just had more to give. So far, Cardin hadn't managed to get a solid blow on his opponent, but as it always did, it would come down to luck.

And the time came some time into the second half of the fight- no one could tell if it had been seconds or hours since they started, only that both were practically dead on their feet. Another voice was chiding Jaune to pay attention to his Aura and go on the defense, but it lost out easily to the biting tone telling him to finish it.

He leapt with this intent.

Scraping his mace against the ground as he lumbered at Jaune, Cardin probably realized this too even if he had forgotten everything else in between, about the time his Dust ran out. Relearning that Jaune was faster, he surmised that he had no way to heave his weapon up in time on his own without propellant.

He tried anyway- or it looked like that, the handle slipping through his grip as he swung. Letting go halfway through and grasping on to Jaune's shield, he wrenched the metal plate from the other boy's hand. Yanking Jaune forward in the process where he fell upon Cardin's fist.

Jaune buckled under the solid blow. Even before he hit the ground, he knew his Aura was gone. He had lost the match, if not his strength, and he could have continued to fight but didn't much see the point. The arm still holding _Crocea Mors_ felt heavy, too much to lift.

Though that could have also been Cardin stepping on it.

"Smile, Pretty-boy."

Watching that spiked wrecking-ball be raised above him, Jaune wondered who Cardin was talking to. Until he realized that it didn't matter, and he didn't care.

"Enough!"

It took longer than expected for the outside world to break from their stupor. Less than a few seconds for the mace to fly out of Cardin's hands, nearly dragging him across the arena and to the foot of an unamused Glynda Goodwitch.

"You alright, Jaune?"

Whereas the battle and even the things before had happened to someone else, the firm yet slender hand reached out to him in that separate universe, letting in the blinding lights and pulling him back into his body.

"Yeah… uh, I think." Finding at last that he could, as well as process the feelings inhabiting this bag of flesh. The world of the living looked rosy.

"Jaune!" Others- what looked like _everyone_ else rushed the stage and nearly bowled him over with their exuberance. The youngest of all burrowing her way to the forefront. "That was great!"

Thinking did not translate to speaking. If he had voiced his thoughts, he would have pointed out that from the very beginning he hadn't approached the match with anything other than a primitive exigence. However, that didn't happen.

"Um, okay?" A part of him was still obliged to decry, "But I lost."

"So?" Blake scoffed in the background, and to his surprise he could picture it. She did that often, didn't she? "You did a lot better than you used to."

"She's right." The monotone of Ren set off a plethora of echoes he could hardly remember. "It's certainly a personal best."

"That's our captain!" Carrying half the enthusiasm herself, Nora would have been elated with the fact he could stand on his own two feet. Ironically, Jaune found that he was, too.

' _There's no reason to compare yourself to anyone else but yourself.'_ And this comment existed separately from all of them, yet somehow right in the heart of it too. _'You did good, kid.'_

"You did fine, Jaune." The hand which lifted him up clapped him on his shoulder. And to his surprise, Jaune held his ground. Maybe he was making progress. "Although… you still need to learn how to use your shield properly." Even the criticism sounded… friendly. "I could show you, if you want."

Jaune blinked in the bright lights, but she was still talking to him. They all still were, even if it felt like he hadn't seen these people- his classmates, his friends, in centuries.

"Yeah… sure. I think I'd like that."

It was all coming back to him.

"It will have to wait until after Mr. Arc visits the infirmary." Plowing, rather than tiptoeing her way into his reality, Glynda reached out to manhandle his face and remind him that yes, he still felt pain.

"Ow." Complaining as the professor roughly rubbed a cloth over his face, only after she was done did Jaune realize he could see more than just red.

"Hold that there." Pressing the cloth against his lacerated forehead and forcing his hand against that, Glynda backed away and all but banished them from her classroom. "Ms. Nikos, Mr. Ren, Ms. Valkyrie, please escort your captain and do not leave his side until he is handed over to Ms. Schwarzkopf. Tell her it is possible that he has a concussion."

"But I _feel_ fine," Not removing the cloth to earn her ire, Jaune did take a step forward to plead his case and almost spilled over Ruby who hadn't been quite so cowed by Goodwitch to take the requisite three steps back.

"Infirmary. Now. And as for you," Turning to observe a Cardin who had changed rolls with his adversary, watching the spectacle but not participating in it. "…The rest of you, on to your next class. I have third years coming in and I need to clear the arena. Get on, I don't want to see anyone dawdling. I won't be writing any excuses to your next instructor if you're late."

"Well, I guess we best get got." With only minutes left, the only ones willingly apart gathered around the supposed 'winner'. Cardin's partner Russel gave the taller boy a hearty slap on the back which only made him blink. "Good job, Big Guy."

"Fuck off," Trying to sound angry and jerk his shoulder away, Cardin found he could do neither as he watched the bright mob of color fade away from the light. There was no anger left, only dark emptiness.

"Yeah, alright. Let's go."

* * *

 _Well Kid, I guess this is it._

 _What? You were expecting something more? Danger, adventure, a chance to be that knight in shining armor? A job well done? Sorry Kid, life don't work like that, you gotta take what you can get. Though I guess you know by now._

 _And I am sorry. Maybe I could'a done something different, but that's just who I am. It's all in the past, anyway. 'Sides, you got some better people looking out for you now, and they've waited a long time for you to come back._

 _Thing is, I remember what I was here for. Why I couldn't let go._

 _I got somebody waiting for me too, and I'm no longer afraid of seeing them again._

 _Sayonara, Gaki._

* * *

' _So long, you crazy bastard.'_

Amidst the chatter and fervor of the hallways she almost missed the non-sequitur whispered behind their hasty herd.

" _Something up, Naruto?"_

' _Maybe,'_ Her mood was infectious, he enjoyed the fact that she was cheerful and was cheerful because she could tell he was too. _'I think one of those stories I told you finally got its happy ending.'_

Maybe it sounded more wistful than happy, because Ruby's pace was dragged slowly down by all that it entailed. But it was definitely the latter, and her smile, big enough for both of them, foretold this.

" _I'm glad."_ Even as she desperately squeezed the necklace beneath her uniform.

"Ruby?" The others had noticed her falling behind.

"Team RWBY," They all stopped and waved on their compatriots, four of whom hobbled off down a different corridor than the one they were headed, and that the headmaster had appeared from. "I won't keep you long. I just wanted to let you know that I receive your proposal, and that everything is set for tonight. Try not to tire yourselves out too much today, alright?"

This was good news, yet like Naruto's, it did carry a certain burden of knowledge.

"Right." Grin condensed so that it was a nova of determination, the captain of team RWBY awkwardly saluted the headmaster. "You can count on us!"

* * *

"I can count, ya know?"

After the third time he'd been asked to identify the same number of fingers, Jaune was feeling a little silly- well, sillier than he would normally being the center of attention in such a crowded space.

"Yes, I think we've determined that." Nothing denying sarcasm, the new nurse checked a box off on her list, setting down the clipboard and replacing it with a small flashlight. "Hold still for me and follow the light with your eyes."

The tape which secured his forehead bandage strained at his eyelids, but he did as was told because he could actually understand the purpose of this test. Not to mention that he doubted if he'd have been able to refuse with the unnervingly strong way the nurse gripped his chin.

"Good. Perfect."

"So, he doesn't have a concussion?" Pyrrha asked with cheer surpassing the baseline already set.

"I never said that." Her face was one that contradicted itself with a smile so that no one could tell if she was serious. "…But yes, it seems that way."

Collectively JNPR sighed as they slowly became accustomed to this new personality. Ms. Schwarzkopf was vastly different than the scar-faced man previously who wanted nothing to do with them.

"I would like to conduct a few more tests, however."

"What kind of tests?" Seemingly more concerned than Jaune himself, Pyrrha regarded the admittedly attractive woman with an unease she wasn't entirely able to quantify.

"Just some questions." Clearly the other woman could see what it was though, and confronted the former Mystralian champion with all the armaments of femininity. "They are standard for any medical report. Though I believe a few of them Mr. Arc might be more comfortable answering… alone."

"Let's go." As the party with least interest- or perhaps because he had a distinct interest in getting out of there, Ren all but dragged his female teammates out of the examining room.

"Why, Ren?! What if it's a test and Jaune needs our help? He hasn't had a chance to study!"

From the sound of things, it was proving difficult.

"I think Jaune will be fine. We'll be waiting right outside, just in case."

Reassuring to some and not others, Jaune wasn't comfortable until he heard the heavy doors slam shut.

Afterwards, there was the other uncomfortableness to think about.

"Now then," Even with a name that completely belied her face, Schwarzkopf- Galya as she had introduced herself, was a beautiful woman and Jaune would have to be dead or out of his mind not to notice this. "Shall we get started?"

Although, with her silver hair bordering on blonde and manner in which she asserted complete control in her dominion, she reminded Jaune of his elder sisters. While 'that kind' of discussion would be uncomfortable, it would be bearable so long as he kept this comparison in mind.

"Would you like to tell me how many times per week you masturbate?" Turns out, it was nearly impossible to retain the image of his studious and nigh-celibate sisters when the woman in front of him flowed into her seat, draped herself over his eyeballs and quirked her lips just so. "…Or would you prefer to talk about what's really going on?"

"…Um, what?"

Jaune could be forgiven for not comprehending the question the first time around, and Galya resisted the urge to exacerbate his fluster by chuckling at him. Instead, a molecular shift occurred within her posture and her smile to level her seriousness on par with other aspects.

"While these are real questions, unless something relevant happens we don't need to ask them. I'm more concerned with other possible complications. Like: how many hours per day do you keep the Dust crystal on your person?"

The warm hand which touched his cheeks turned icy cold and wrapped itself around Jaune's neck as he realized that this woman was dangerous in more ways than one. His own hands betrayed him by going for his hiding spot instead of the weapon which he didn't have.

"Relax," Treating this overreaction just like his embarrassment, Galya calmed him down with just a smile and a subtle gesture. "Ozpin and select people on staff already know. We only wish to make sure that you are healthy and not having any issues."

Clearly, he was not in the best of sorts. His twisted instincts were the least sign of this, piled onto the fever dream his past few months had been. Something was definitely amiss, and it started with the fact that he hadn't sought any help.

"I'm fine."

"That's not the question I asked."

He stiffened as he once against recognized his body's rebelliousness.

"The only times I don't have it are when I shower."

Not even now when it was less a death-threat and more dead-weight did he dare remove the gem from his person. It was no longer the fear of that suffocating sensation which could be levied against him, but a morbid fear of the unknown, that something should go unaccountably wrong should he do so. But, maybe this was just his delusions of grandeur again.

"Do you have it on you now?"

"Yes."

"May I see it?"

Fighting himself the whole way, he slipped the stone free from a hidden pocket he had sewn into his new shirt which folded into the waist. Sitting there in his fingers, it looked no different than any other Dust he'd seen in his life- Little different from the whitewashed walls and frigid tile floor. And yet when her python-like fingers went to pick it up, he hesitated.

"This is…" Examining it against the fluorescent lamps, white on white making her face seem even more pale, breathless in extasy. "…Just a rock."

"What?" Now he was the one robbed of breath and color. "Are you sure? I mean, you don't- y'know, hear… anything?"

She shook her head with that same irreplaceable smile still incised.

"Nope." Popping the 'P' with a giggle at his hollow face, she shook gently it by her ear as if it were a lightbulb. "Not a peep. It's just plain Dust."

Reality reawaken in Jaune tried to tell him that this had been the case the entire time. That it had only been his grand hallucinations which entrapped him. He had created his own demon in order to spur his growth, and then, finally outgrown the need when he accepted both himself and his friends.

But there was something else. Something was different between now and then, and it wasn't just Jaune.

"Here, you can have it back." When offered he still reclaimed it greedily, only to discover that she was indeed correct and there was no spark of life beneath that frosty surface.

"Is it… safe?"

"Well, keeping any Dust on your person is a tad questionable, but I'm more concerned with your mental health. You're not hearing any more 'voices' are you?"

Staring at the speck in his palm, he waited expectantly. There was a creeping cold, befitting of ice Dust which burned his palm. But the fire of passion had long since gone out and taken up residence in his chest.

"No. No I'm not."

"Well, good then!" Once again straining the limits of her beauty, she beamed a smile and stood them both up. "Nothing else seems wrong and I'm perfectly confident discharging you to your team."

Before Jaune could protest this abrupt end to their visit, He was whisked away by hands which practically scooped him out of his seat and flung him down the hall. Apparently, there was a lot of time that needed to be made up.

Alone once again, Galya watched the doors which were once inward-facing wobble back and forth in the breeze as she smiled in amusement.

When at last things had settled and a ghostly quiet returned to the infirmary, the kindly expression fell from her face as she slumped into her seat. There was still a smile as she picked up her clipboard, but it was one which strained at the conscience rather than her face.

Her finger with sharpened nail like a fang ran down a short list buried beneath the boilerplate stack.

"Jaune Arc, huh?" Stopping at his name which was listed with nothing else, she scratched it off the page. "Pity."

* * *

Nothing was left unaccounted for; the headmaster had seen to that and each of their personalities had double-checked it. Plans A through D complete with their contingencies and escape routes had been tattooed into their minds. And if this hadn't been enough, each had another external memory to remind them, a safety net beneath it all.

Yet, were they not all fortune's favors in the end? Playthings in the grand scheme and baby-food for the time being, made to be chewed up and spit out-

' _Oh, quit it. There's no need to be so dramatic, just keep focused and prepared for when things go wrong.'_

When, not if. In the time that she had come to know him, Blake knew that Shikamaru never made a mistake. So she didn't question this, his wording or his righteousness. It was the nature of things to go wrong, which was why she had people to catch her when she fell.

Sticking close to the ground now, in the shadows of shadows she slunk and shimmied, pressing close against the familiar brick walls of the warehouse district which all looked the same except for those three slash-marks like breadcrumbs guiding the way.

No one noticed her. Even as the crowds thickened, she proved invisible to eyes that were supposed to be as sharp as the Fang which was their symbol. Maybe she could have bluffed her way in, blended with her people underneath the anonymity of those white masks- she still could, if worse cam to worse.

Until then, she was comfortable in the corner of the darkness, as comfortable as she could be given the situation. For these were no longer her people, and they were busy trying to spread their cancerous ideology to others. For now, she was powerless to stop them, relegated to being a watcher.

It was in no way easy though, and she doubted she could have done it alone.

' _Speaking of, now that we're here we should check in. Everyone in place?'_

The chorus came in softly and Blake strained to hear it above her thrumming heart. But it was clear enough to her partner, and best of all it was secure. Nothing could possibly give them away.

Therefore, she had to concern herself with the impossible.

' _Don't worry, we're versed in the impossible as well. If it comes to that, they'll get us out of here.'_

Nothing left to do then but sit back and watch the show.

The crowds were already agitated before anyone even hit the stage. Potential recruits and first-timers gleaned their energy from the uniformed members who knew something important lay in store and were just as eager to find out what. The stale air had become thick with dust and chatter and pheromones that Blake struggled to breath through her nose. When at last something happened, she was just as ready as anyone else.

"Brothers and sisters,"

The air that she had been struggling to inhale became stuck in her throat, for she recognized this voice even before its owner entered the limelight.

' _You have some history with this guy.'_

There was no question, for Shikamaru had been there at the very beginning- the supposed end to her and Adam's relationship. The comment was meant to stir her own thoughts, remind her to breathe again and constrain the pounding of her heart.

In the time it took her to do so, she missed most of Adam's speech. But it was clear enough from the tentative applause that he was just the host and not the entertainment.

"Hello, hello, hello! Thank you for having me," Though the main act really had no need of introduction. "Yes, it is I, Roman Torchwick, friend to all creatures great and small!"

Not even those experienced members had imagined a surprise like this, and it took everyone including Blake by surprise to see the redhead so blatantly parading about on stage. With undertones of bloodlust scattered about, their shock did not last for long as the indignation caught like wildfire.

Roman soaked up the animosity as he swaggered gaily up to the forefront, faithfully guarded by a few White Fang who must have known what to expect. Though they did little to quell the audience, and it was Roman's boisterous voice itself that caught the attention.

"Oh, don't let me stop you. I agree, humans are vile, disgusting creatures. The worst! -Case in point-" Relishing the attention, any was good attention as he talked his way into their hearts and minds. "And we just get worse as time goes by. Don't believe me? You think things are better now because they give you a little more 'freedom'? I think they're just placating you, giving you the crusts and scarps and telling you to enjoy it. You have a place- we all have a place, and it's always at the bottom! Just above the shit to keep you from drowning. I might be _**Scum**_ but even I know this- I'm right there with you, human trash. You've got to take as much freedom as you can carry away!"

Such genuine passion was becoming infectious, communicable even to those who had not known what to expect. There was a universal feeling that demanded change of any sort, and this human was preaching to that, to those intransigent souls.

"Lucky for you all, I have quick hands…"

What was worse, he had substance to back up his philosophy. Ill-gotten gains he unveiled with a showman's flourish, the lights came on and illuminated his accomplishments. Voices mumbling agreement suddenly fell silent in disbelief bordering on horror- suddenly surging back up to a roar of approval when they saw what gifts he bore.

The Atlesian war machine stood there in all its menacing glory, lifelessly awaiting their spark.

"…But you know what's even worse than humans, the ones who jealously guard their position?" As the volume had shifted to the Faunus mob, Roman's soft-spoken words still cut through the din. "It's the ones you think you know, the ones you believe are on your side. They advocate peace and understanding, but the truth is that they want to keep everything as it is. The status quo benefits them, and they're happy so long as there are people beneath them who are worse off than they."

The clog in her windpipe was rudely shoved aside by her throbbing heart as Blake interpreted where he was leading. Though his intention was shrouded behind a shadow cast over his eyes, Blake could see his smirk from her spot near the back and could practically feel his mind searching her out.

"You know who these people are, the worst of offenders…"

-No, he _**was**_ calling her out, looking straight at her through blinding light and binding shadow. She held her breath until the last word as panic constricted around that lump in her throat.

"-Case in point, Ms. Belladonna, why don't you step on up and give a bow!"

' _Abort mission! Extraction, now!'_

Screaming in her ear juxtaposed the quiet murmurs of confusion around her, the silent denial frozen on the face of Adam Taurus milling about in the shadow of the Atlesian Paladin. With a piercing note, Roman winked his flowery eyelashes at her.

Everything was hidden soon enough behind a buzzing shroud which also muted the panicked screams. Insects worming their way from the woodwork, from the invisible cracks and from the ceiling flew around in a black snowstorm, providing the perfect distraction for her to make her escape. Even then, she might not have moved if they hadn't carried her, if those shadows hadn't guided her like a puppet up to the roof where the rest of her team was waiting.

"Right, cover's blown, let's bail!"

"No, we can't!" Self-preservation took a back seat the minute she spied the stolen SDC property. There was no way Weiss could let that kind of machinery fall to the whims of men like Roman Torchwick or an organization like the White Fang- she honestly didn't know which was worse at this point. "We have to disable the Paladin!"

"Wait a second, Ms. By-the-Books, our task was just observation, quick in and out, with the emphasis on _**out**_."

"-Barring extenuating circumstances!" Weiss argued back. "I think this counts!"

"Guys, Yang's right," Trying to assert her responsibility against her meager height, Ruby stepped between her sister and partner. "We're not supposed to get involved unless there's really no choice!"

*Crash! Crunch! Screee….*

The roof groaned under the weight of irony and the Paladin which had boosted up through the ceiling unimpeded and now stood there patiently awaiting them to finish their discussion.

"Freezer-burn!"

No choice, no further argument between the two who rushed the monstrous machine which had already deployed a small caliber Gatling from its shoulder and swept the team with bullets. None of the 6,000 rounds fired per minute hit the scattered huntresses as Yang and Weiss took off on either side and Blake regained function in time to swap her and Ruby out for a couple of shadow clones.

Thrown forward by her gauntlets funneling fire Dust, Yang looked ready to reach the Paladin first and so it shifted its attention to her- or would have if Weiss hadn't already froze both its feet and its waist into position. All Yang had to deal with was the shoulder-mounted turret, which she did with a backhand almost delivered as an afterthought.

' _Access port is between the shoulder hydraulics and the explosive screw for the cockpit.'_

"How 'bout that, the pervert is actually right." Yang remarked as she blindly smashed in and ripped off the almost unseen panel.

' _You better hope I'm more than right, Brat! Plug me in!'_

"Just _Yang_ on!"

"No time for jokes!" Weiss called from below. "Hurry up, this thing is already breaking loose!"

"Done!"

Almost as soon as she shoved the partly-chloritized crystal into the ten-prong auxiliary port, the entire machine come to a screeching stop. Servos protested the sudden abandonment of their duty and hydraulics decompressed with a forlorn hiss as the whole metal beast seemed to slump over.

'… _And done here. Right, your turn. Finish it.'_

"Can do!"

Having a harder time removing the jammed Jiraiya, Yang palmed the still-glowing gemstone and wound up a massive punch atop the mech's cockpit. That reinforced glass canopy was nothing under the veritable hammer of god as it came crashing down with all the might earthly forces could muster.

' _Got to say, Tsunade might have been a better match, but it's been a pleasure working with you.'_

Yang leapt from her self-made crater before the hulking scrap-metal could topple over the edge with her in it. Sashaying up to her team while dusting her palms.

"Oh, believe, me, the pleasure's all mine."

"There, are you satisfied?" Sounding distinctly less so, Blake obviously didn't want to hang around.

"Yes," Thinking for only a second, Weiss admitted this much easier than she would have before.

"Alright then-"

In a flash they were gone, poppy-red petals scattered in a spiral behind them.

* * *

"-Let's gooooh I feel sick."

Still not used to the sensation of her soul being hijacked, Yang dropped to a knee on an unknown rooftop, somewhere much brighter than they were before. The others weren't doing much better, with the exception that they were quieter about it.

Ruby herself was the best of all at hiding her discomfort. The sharp sensation stabbing through her arm wasn't the same affliction suffered by her teammates, but that didn't make it any more bearable. The pain made her almost as woozy as everyone else, and secretly she braced herself against a clothesline pole while keeping her wrist in a death-grip.

"Well… that went well." It was hard to tell if Blake was being sarcastic as she was turned away, covering a hand over her mouth. But neither she nor anyone else seemed to notice their captain's struggle.

' _It did, actually.'_ Reluctantly, she and everyone else agreed.

"It could'a been a lot worse." Planting her hands on her hips after patting herself down, Yang stretched side to side, and in doing so took a look at where they had ended up. "Wow, you got us all the way to downtown. Not bad, Sis!"

Ruby nodded while still biting her lip, hoping the darkness hid it.

"So, we're in the clear?"

"Seems like it." Waiting a tick to see if she was contradicted, Yang excitedly broke the mounting expectation. "Hey! As long as we're downtown, let's celebrate! I know this great club-"

"No." Recovered enough to say this with an amount of commanding, Blake remained unflinching as Yang deflated. "Although… I do know a café that stays open late."

Hyped up from adrenaline and anticipating the crash once it wore off, a shot of caffeine and sugar sounded like just the ticket to get them through the night along with the rough morning which awaited them.

"Sounds good to me." Although not one to so easily dismiss the seriousness that they had gone through, Weiss could get on board with the unspoken logic.

"Aye!" Ruby might skip the coffee, but the implied promise of sweets sounded like the best thing to distract her from the lingering pain.

"I see I'm outvoted and overruled." Throwing up her hands with a smile, Yang was quick to add a condition to their extracurricular outing. "-But no sugar for Ruby, it's past midnight."

"Awe, come on!"

' _Seriously? After all this you're going to say no to a treat?'_

"Yeah, I agree with them on this one. Let'em eat cake." Blake pushed with a smirk. "She certainly earned it."

"Alright, alright." Seeing how quickly she was being outnumbered, Yang relinquished before it came to begging.

"Yay! C'mon, let's go!"

It was a little thing in the grand manifest of all things, perhaps even a foolish notion and elation which seized them. Yet it was important, that much they knew. A small victory that should be celebrated and an event that couldn't be swept under the rug.

Because even then, Ruby had the feeling- they _all_ had the feeling that things had been just a smidge too easy.

* * *

"She couldn't have gone far, I want her found!"

Spitting mad, as well as the last of the flies from his mouth, Adam Taurus barked these orders at his subordinates. He all but tore them from trying to assist and reassure their fellow Faunus so they could work on this task. They had no choice but to scatter like the swarm of insects which had besieged them.

Soon there wasn't anyone left in the sickly yellow light but himself and his lieutenant who watched his superior with a controlled nervousness. All their potential recruits had fled the scene in a panic, and no one was sure whether some would be back.

"You go too."

"But sir-"

"Go!"

In his rage and frustration Adam could barely move, yet his subordinate knew better than to trust this petrified illusion for long. He might have been bigger and stronger, but there was a reason why Adam was their commander beyond the bloodthirsty sword straining in his grasp.

"Yessir."

With grace and speed one would not expect from such a big man, he charged out on the heels of the bloodhounds whom had already been sent on the hunt.

Then, Adam was alone with his rage.

-But not just rage, because there was something else there which still betrayed him, decried his true feelings. Blake had meant something to him once, and he had never been quite sure what it was. So now he was wracked with painful indecision. It felt like a sword stabbing into his spine and spreading numbness throughout the rest of his body while his mind suffered all the anguish. He had no idea what he would do when they had her.

"Boy, this place sure cleared out fast. Do I know how to bring down a house, or what?"

-And not just alone, because even then Adam was plagued by ghouls.

"What are you still doing here, Torchwick? I thought you were dead."

"Oh no, quite alive, but I thank you for your concern." Even though Adam couldn't seem to turn his head to face him, he could see the crook's smug visage. "There's also the little matter of services rendered. I couldn't rest easily knowing I was owed recompense."

"You don't work for us, you work for Cinder." Not wanting to deal with him or anything right now, Adam glared at the splintered stage lest he smite this annoying rat and earn the woman's ire. "Take it up with her."

"Oh, I will, don't you worry." It felt like he was being patted on the back with the man's cane, and Adam wanted to spin around and slap the man for his impudence- but he found that he _really couldn't_. "In fact, it's her who has yet to own up to certain promises. And I'd like your help holding her accountable."

It was a madman who thought that they could take on Cinder Fall and get away with it. And so, Adam wanted to ask exactly what the deranged man had meant by that, but now he found that he couldn't even speak. Did his anger really control him that much?

"What's the matter, Adam? Cat got your tongue?" In the flesh, Roman's smug smile was even more revolting. And though he wanted to turn or to blink it out of existence there was really nothing he could do but track the man's lazy pace across the empty stage. "I suppose I'll take your silence as acceptance. That alright?"

And of course, despite his mental protests and haranguing, Adam could do nothing but try and slay the man with his eyes as he practically danced with malicious glee in front of him.

"Great! Don't worry, it won't be that bad, really. -Or so I'm told."

This only succeeded in turning a smidgen of his anger into panic. But so far Roman had been true to his word and he didn't feel a thing- _not anything_ as if his senses had been shut off from the neck down. It was probably even for the best that he held still in this paralysis as Neo delicately enlarged the puncture she had made in his spine, shifting aside bundles of raw nerves with all the expertise of a surgeon.

"From what I hear, it's just like falling asleep."

Still with her own Dust crystal dangling from a necklace, Neo took the one Roman had loaned her and did as she was instructed. The glowing scarlet gem stood out against the free-flowing blood and practically sparked in anticipation when it neared that autonomous highway.

Then it was done, the wound was patched up with duct-tape like a cardboard box. There was an emptiness behind Adam's mask to reinforce this analogy, tension in jaw having gone slack moments before.

"Wakey, wakey. Let him go, Neo."

The girl did so happily. Pinching the necklace and letting the gem guide her hand, she tapped it against invisible targets on the body to set it free from rigor mortis.

Bones dropping freely, Adam caught himself before he hit the ground. When he straightened, it was like he was being pulled up on strings.

"Testing, testing, we all there?" Adam did not answer at first, flexing every muscle from the toes up and saving the jaw for last. "Well, did you at least enjoy the show?"

"Tactless and short." A voice that was not Adam's came from his mouth, flat except for the hand which was massaging his jaw. "And this body… has way too much stress. It won't last another fifty fears. I doubt it will last until the end of this."

"We don't need it to." Roman tapped his cane, issuing a proclamation. "It will serve its purpose for now, and then we can work on getting a replacement when necessary."

"Yes, we will." A certainty which made Roman shiver and Neo surreptitiously move around to be by his side. "That machine wasn't too bad. Paladin, they called it? It has potential."

"Fine, be sure to add it to your Christmas list and I'm sure Santa will give you one."

"One? Oh no." Still testing out the new accommodations, 'Adam' tried a smile. "I will need an army."

"That too." Heedless of the fact that it creeped him out, Roman tried to mimic the expression. "And I'm sure general Ironwood would be happy to foot the bill."

'Adam' nodded and went back to staring at his hand. Bearing in mind he hadn't been in possession of a body in eons, even such a simple feature was cause for appraisal. A complexity and intricacy he could admire, but a frailness that revolted him.

"Fearful things, humans."

"Well, technically you're a Faunus…" Roman clammed up, for once not letting his mouth run its course. But 'Adam' didn't even seem to notice.

"Commander!" Nor did he pay much attention to the winded White Fang Lieutenant who returned while Roman had been busy keeping his eye on the pseudomorph. "A thousand apologies! The trail went cold just past the building and we can't find no other trace of her. It- it- it's like she up and disappeared."

"Hmm…" With that contemplative smile still drawn up on his face, 'Adam' was clearly of a different bearing than he was before. Though it went unnoticed under the layer of sweat dripping from the Lieutenant's brow. "Would you say that you are a competent man, Lt?"

Mortified, moreover disappointed in himself for failing his superior, the battle-hardened man nonetheless was predisposed to answer.

"Uh, yessir, well, I do my best."

Reflecting the sincerity in his acceptance of the answer, 'Adam' nodded.

And then in a swift stroke that was faster than Roman had ever seen him move in life, 'Adam' cut off the man's bowed head.

"Hmm…" Same expression, unchanged by what had just happened, the redhead examined the doubly crimson blade even as the headless body slumped over and began pooling blood at his feet. "Human. Faunus. There isn't much difference is there? Yes, this body will do for now. It already comes with so many useful puppets."

While 'Adam's attention was more affixed on examining the mechanism of his sword, Roman drew Neo closer in to himself with an arm protectively over her shoulder.

"The lesser of two evils, My Dear. The lesser of two evils…"


	14. Cenozoic: Paleocene

**Merry Christmas, y'all! I say this unequivocally because in my time zone it is in fact Christmas day. And really, what I mean more than anything by this phrase is that I wish you all good health, good fortune, and people to share it with. It doesn't matte what denomination you are, gender, ethnicity, species, this is the time of year where we should all reflect back on how we treat others as people.**

 **In this respect, I give you my meager offering. May you find some pleasure in it during moments of boredom waiting for guests or presents, tomorrow after the humdrum sets it, or another Christmas from now far in the future. If at all.**

* * *

"The truth is that any coffee will work, it just has to be ground fine enough. *Sniff*"

The sun fell quickly this time of year in the Northern hemisphere along with the temperature, made obvious by the pervading sniffle. It might have been closer to dinnertime, but a cup of something warm sounded good regardless. It would get her through the long night that was gradually getting shorter as Summer approached.

"I've been using this tin to measure, I think it's roughly about a half-a-cup. Fill it 3/4th 's with coffee and two spoonfuls of sugar. The rest with spice, if you have or want."

"I usually prefer my coffee black."

"As do I, but the sugar here serves a purpose. *Sniff*"

Not their usual conversation. Not that anything about this situation was usual, but Bruno seemed to make it so. Wandering in, out of the bluing twilight to find Lt. Schnee at his kitchenette table, he simply knocked the muck off his boots and wandered over to the tiny stove to begin his task.

"The sugar crystallizes at the top of the pot and forms a cap. This allows the water to infuse more of the grounds."

If he was going to be interrogated further, he might as well be comfortable. Two birds, one stone, all that. Thinking, he emptied his jacket pockets of the rocks he'd picked up and tossed the decrepit coat on the sofa-bed.

"Cardamom, right?"

"Yes," Even though he couldn't smell it himself right now, soon enough the cardboard box he was living in would reek of it. "Clove too. Sometimes cinnamon if I feel like it- not to mention what I have."

Winter nodded in appreciation, not just of the straight answer at long last but the hospitality which was quite frankly unexpected. Thoughtful consideration, including the fact that the man deliberately kept his runny nose away from the ingredients.

"It took me a while to recognize the scent. Even if my family could afford such things, it just wasn't all that common in Atlas." After drifting back into the kitchen nook, his eyes never left the single burner stove, but she could tell that he was listening intently. "There were a lot of things that I never experienced until I left. A lot of things I took for granted."

"It's important to have the right kettle; preferably tall, but it needs to have sloped sides- that's critical." It might have seemed like blather, a deferral to keep the conversation light. But he was listening, and so was she. "The traditional way is to do this one cup at a time, in a little pot called an ibrik. This way is better for a group, or leftovers."

It really was a conversation about nothing- but it was something different than the one-sided questioning which she had been doing thus far. An honest-to-goodness give and take.

"So, what do you do all day up on the mountain?"

At first it seemed like he wasn't going to answer her, or like all times before, with a blithe and uninformative remark. Then she realized he was merely concentrating on the pot which had come to a head and was waiting for the perfect moment to remove it from the flame. Following an ancient rhythm, he whisked the kettle away from the fire and shut it off. After waiting a requisite beat, he cascaded the muddy liquid into two tiny cups that had been waiting centuries, making sure to filter out most of the grounds and loose leaves using the lid.

"Mapping, mostly." A short journey from the counter to the tiny table which was bolted into the wall, he was very careful not to disturb so much as a single bubble on the opaque surface of the liquid. Winter watched him as she had the entire time, finding admiration in this studious task and dutiful execution. "Taking notes."

"We already have maps of all the islands, though. -Thank you." Not touching the cup which had been set before her, simply looking at it and observing Basayev to see when the ideal time to take a sip was.

"Not in detail." He sat down opposite her at that table which could barely hold the two cups, let alone the two of them. "As you remarked, my degree is in geology; and I'm not totally out of practice. There's still a lot we don't know about these islands, how they came to be and why they have so much Dust."

"So you think that mapping the rock units might tell us something we didn't already know."

"Maybe. Mostly I just think it should be recorded before it's too late."

Both knew that the SDC would level the entire mountain if they thought it was worth it. With the explosive material they had imported, they might just be able to do it too.

"I did my own thesis on Dust, you know?"

"I know." Somehow, she knew he did. And strangely, she didn't mind.

Winter smiled at the same time she picked up her cup, her slim fingers slipping easily into the dainty handle while she noted Bruno had to cradle the porcelain thimble in both hands.

Training and lingering suspicion had her wait until he took a sip first, a clearly practiced action which sucked the bittersweet skim off the top and killed the last of his sniffles. Then she followed, allowing the untested concoction between her pale lips.

It was… good. Great, even. Better than she thought it would be, and yet at the same time, everything she expected. Sweet, spicy, alerting, calming. Hesitating to call it perfect because nothing ever should be, and even Bruno's thoughtful face disclosed this truth.

"Lt. Schnee," Foremost, completing the action and setting the cup back down on the table. Not mixing business and pleasure. "Can I ask you something?"

Tidbits and common knowledge had so far been exchanged, but now something authentic was being asked and Winter felt a twinge of embarrassment. Not because she was afraid, but because she'd been so previously bold and inconsiderate compared to this delicate probe.

"Yes." She owed him at least one.

"Why are you here?"

It was not the same question she'd asked him even if it used the same words.

"Perhaps I'm flirting with you."

This was a terrible bluff and even worse joke, so she hid her scowl behind another contemplative sip while Bruno awaited her unblinkingly. He personally never considered himself a handsome man, and neither was Winter the type to exploit her feminine wiles.

"You are the only thing on this island that I don't understand." Setting down the cup, her icy tongue was being thawed by the warm liquid. "You know my history, I know most of the higherups in the SDC like the back of my hand. And while I don't trust them, I understand them. I know their tricks. Then there's the laborers. After I vetted all their files, they were put under the scrutiny of my soldiers so there's very little for me to actually do. There's not a Grimm that will come within leagues of these islands."

"Fair enough." But even as he took another controlled gulp, he kept his earthy gaze on her.

"…And honestly, I'm pissed about being here." Whether it was the informal setting, the plying of indulgences or his dispassionate stare, Winter felt inclined to come clean with her own personal grievances. "I was scheduled for duty in Vale at the Vytal tournament, and I was hoping to be able to see my little sister there. But then Ozpin up and decides to finally grant this concession and the General jumps on it. Of course, I'm his first choice for glorified guard duty."

"-And I'm 'Ozpin's man'." Bruno concluded for her.

"Yes."

Despite the shame of unprofessionalism, Winter felt better admitting this out loud. And if the gentle smile was anything to go by, Bruno did too. Although, it could have also been rueful. That was something she had noticed- should have taken into account from the beginning. The man couldn't hide his true feelings, even if they weren't always obvious.

"I was in your class." Halting with the cup hovering just under her nose, Winter saw the surprise in her muddy reflection. "Back in the Atlesian Military Academy. We both sat in the front row. Even back then, my eyesight was terrible." He chuckled at himself, scratching at a bit of fluff which escaped from his knitted beanie. "Although, I did have a buzz-cut back then…"

"I… I'm afraid I don't remember."

"I didn't expect you to. It was only for one year. After that you went off to the special forces and I… drifted."

"Right."

Bruno wasn't exactly sure why he said that. It was one thing to let his thoughts show through facial tics, but there was no reason for him to say anything about back then. It wouldn't convince her he wasn't hiding anything. There was no sense in making her- either of them feel guilty. No sense in trying to reclaim nostalgia that wasn't there.

What was the point to any of this?

"I'm not your enemy."

This is what he believed. Their détente had become tense. This was his fault as much as hers, he admitted at last. And even if they couldn't see eye to eye, maybe she could at least see that.

Though as the minutes carried on in silence and both sipped their drinks absently, he wondered if it were true. He looked at the stacks of books bequeathed to him which were no doubt worth more than the building they were stored in- probably worth more than his life. And yet, were they not worthless until put to use?

Being a scapegoat was perhaps not the worst thing.

"I should get going." Time had slipped past yet again, settled the dregs at the bottom of the cup in a thick scum. "Thank you, Mr. Basayev. For the coffee. It was quite good."

"Wait." Only when they both were standing did their proximity register- to Winter at least, as Bruno focused on collecting the cups and crept into the kitchen. Clearly watching him work, he poured the vast remainder of the pot into a cleaned travel thermos and handed it over the small counter. "Here. You look like you could use it."

Tactless, yet sincere. An appropriate summary of the man himself, Winter accepted his gesture.

"Thanks." Perhaps they were both like that. "Goodnight, Mr. Basayev."

"Goodnight, Lieutenant."

"See you tomorrow."

Intended to make him pause, she looked up from the doorstep to see how he reacted.

"Should I take that as a threat?" In the primitive illumination from the porchlight, he looked as tired as she.

"Take it as you like."

Her foggy breath faded into the night.

* * *

"Dance?" The question struck her out of the clear blue sky, knocking the laden fork out of her hand. "Oh, man, I completely forgot about that!"

"Why are you getting so stressed? You don't _have_ to go."

"What?!" Joining the conversation, Yang stood up and loomed over her partner and sister who had given up on lunch and seemingly life in general. "Of **course** you're going!"

"Why?" Having enough manners to finish her bite, Weiss felt compelled to weigh in her two lien- or twenty, considering how many formal soirees she'd had to attend as a young teen.

They could tell that Yang was winding up for a lecture as she straightened upon the bench seat, and it unnerved them. Because apart from her sister, they'd never seen the self-described 'easy-going girl' get serious about anything.

"One: It'd be a great way to socialize with _**other people**_." This point struck them as both valid and unusually subtle for the otherwise outspoken teen. "Two: Tradition. Three: Pyrrha asked _very_ nicely."

Forced to stand there uncomfortably while viewing the fallout from her simple question, the redhead from team JNPR felt some responsibility for their anguish.

"I just though it would be nice to do something as a group, since we haven't seemed to spend much time together lately." Or at all, since initiation.

"Thank you, Pyrrha." Coming a long way since the initial toadying, Weiss still treated the Mystralian champion with the respect she was due. "I take it then that you will be going? Have you… has anyone asked you yet?"

"Well, Actually…"

"Thinking about making a bid, Weiss?" Now Yang leered across the table at the white-haired girl who had gotten accustomed to these antics enough to simply shake her head and sigh.

"Uncouth, the lot of you."

"Well, what about it?" Seeing she wasn't going to get a reaction, the excitable blonde shifted her attention back to the misplaced redhead. "Got anyone in mind?"

"To tell the truth, no one has asked yet…"

"That wasn't the question." Springing forth from the table like a jack-in-the-box (and with an expression that was just as creepy), Yang seized the champion by her shoulders and bore into her with a fiery passion. "Girl, if there's something you want, you've got to take it! Chase down your heart's desire, beat it into submission and make it your-"

"*Ahem*"

"Right, well…" Used to seizing such gaps in the rhythm of her opponents, Pyrrha used this one to extract herself from Yang's grip. "Thank you for the advice Yang, team RWBY. I, uh, I hope we will see you there."

With that, the stalwart warrior retreated, back to the (relative) sanity of her own team. For once, anticipating the animated antics of Nora with somewhat of a relief even as she saw the girl enacting another one of her dreams.

"Great. You scared her away." Weiss lamented, pushing aside her demolished meal. It was safe to say that all of them were changing their habits to accommodate the extra workload. "I think _**someone's**_ rubbing off on you too much."

Yang just shrugged her shoulders as she plopped herself back onto the bench next to her sister who was still face-down in her orange chicken. She reached over and plucked one of the morsels which had escaped the plate and popped it into her mouth, licking her fingers clean of the sticky glaze.

"When he's not perving, he's actually got some good advice." She finished chewing over both the idea and the chicken, to Weiss's disgust. "Actually, even when he _is_ , not everything is that wrong."

' _Ero-Senin, would you quit trying to corrupt them?'_

' _Bah! I am doing nothing but exposing what is already there. Do you think my books would have sold as well if I had to convince everyone to read them? Everyone has sensuality inside of them that is merely repressed by the prudish norms of society- although, I am beginning to wonder about you, my wayward apprentice.'_

"So, how 'bout it, Rubes? Does our captain have a plan to _lead us into battle_?" Jumping on this opportunity, Yang prodded her despondent sister. Little to know that she had already been asking this question.

' _I don't know what to tell you, Ruby. We never had these kinds of celebrations.'_ This might not have been entirely true, but Naruto had been either too busy, or too discouraged from ever attending them had they existed. _'Sounds like it could be fun, though.'_

" _But I've hardly talked to anyone here besides JNPR."_ Realizing at last the warning that Naruto had bestowed upon her earlier that term. _"It'd be so awkward. I don't even know anyone I could go with."_

' _Well, Blake is right in a way. You don't_ _ **have**_ _to go, but that also means you shouldn't feel any pressure if you do attend.'_ And despite knowing that something like this would happen, Naruto still felt responsible for not being there. _'It's not meant to stress you out. It should be a reward for all your hard work. And besides, it's only a single night.'_

It was only a simple remark, but by now Ruby had come to glean even the smallest subtleties in his inflections and phrasing. An aching in her bones and in her heart said that he would go if he could, if there was but one chance, he would seize it.

' _Naruto is right, it is only one evening.'_ Interjecting at a most (in)opportune moment, Shikamaru decided to be the sober voice of reason. _'What you should be thinking about is whether or not you will enter the Vytal tournament.'_

"Well, of course-"

"No," As if all attention wasn't suddenly on her, Weiss sighed wearily.

' _Why would it be a bad idea?'_ Shino spoke up when he observed the hesitancy in his bearer. _'It is a week of prolonged combat. Even if you were to be exempt from your normal training, it would still be difficult. Why? Because there is still the obligation to be vigilant. Your enemies would not care if you are tired from fighting.'_

"It's also not a good idea to draw too much attention to ourselves. Not at this point." Reluctant, even as she rationalized this. The others looked to Weiss with reforming conceptions, seeing how she had been one of the most vocal proponents for participating several months ago.

"Do you really think it's getting that bad?" Picking herself up to show that she hadn't actually been lying in a pile of food, Ruby asked this question to whomever wished to answer it.

' _Perhaps,'_ As there was always an omnipresent danger, nothing could be said for certain at this point. But Shikamaru did note a subtle shift in the atmosphere around Vale and the school in particular- as subtle as mass troop-movements could be, anyway. _'If they were planning anything big, the festival would be the time to do it.'_

They were speaking from experience, and that was the greatest asset they leant.

"That's still a big 'if'," Yang reasoned soberly. "What do you think, Blake?"

"Both are troublesome." At last entering the conversation proper, she marked her page and set the book down. "But I agree that we should think carefully about entering the tournament. We know Roman is still out there, but we don't know who else he's working with or what they could be planning. Only that it has to do with Dust, and by association, us."

' _Maybe,'_ When Jiraiya spoke like this it was like the transition between dialog and narrator. _'though there is still something more than just that. Ozpin might think he can keep secrets to himself, but I doubt that he even knows what is really going on. Salem is hiding under the guise of his nemesis, when in reality, she is merely a symptom of the larger issue.'_

And the one who probably knew this better than anyone continued to sit in silence. She stood in the eye of a hurricane, chaos and schemes, past and present howling at her from every side and threatening to tear her to shreds should she take a misstep in any direction.

' _But even then, you can't live in fear.'_ That omnipresent voice, reminding her, stepping out of the rain to hold an umbrella over her head. _'The world might be bigger than any one of us, but if you give in to it too much, you will be swallowed up eventually.'_

"Together," Latching on to this idea, to her sister's and Blake's hands, Ruby bound them. "We will weather the storm."

* * *

"It's confirmed. Ironwood has pulled back his mechanized forces to within the Emerald Forest."

Reports coming back in from the squadron of drones she had sent out confirmed this. Thermally-diffusive netting hid the encampment's signatures, but not from the sharp eyes of the drones or her own scrutiny. Koharu had already crosschecked the numbers of AK and Paladin units against what they knew to already be in Vale, so this left but one question.

"How did you manage to get the General to concede to this?"

"He knows that he doesn't have a choice." Neither pleased nor upset, Ozpin simply stated, "He cannot rely on his own security, so he must rely on ours. I promised him that I was taking measures against the White Fang, so he can't use that as an excuse. It was also part of the deal he signed for the mining rights."

"Yes! Indeed, how _is_ Bruno doing? I do envy that young man, in the prime of his career and given opportunity to study such a potential treasure trove of ancient history! I asked him to take as many detailed notes and samples as he could. I am sure he is doing exceptionally, even if he did have somewhat of a lack of motivation in school, he was very dedicated whenever it came to something that interested him. No doubt by now he has finished deciphering the texts you sent as well-"

"From what I understand, he is doing fine." Ozpin interrupted, only slightly more amused than weary with his verbose colleague. "…For now."

Maybe he didn't need to mention this; however, it did quell the green-haired doctor's enthusiasm as he acknowledged with a rather subdued, "Yes."

"How was your own mission, Bartholomew?" Making an effort to sound encouraged, Ozpin leaned towards his two guests.

"Further proof that we will never know everything," Adjusting his glasses, Ooblek appeared both excited and frustrated by this fact. "Every time we go back to Mountain Glenn, we seem to learn something new regarding Grimm behavior. Unfortunately, nothing about the whereabouts or movements of our adversaries. -Well, perhaps I should not say _nothing._ " At Ozpin's silent indication, Ooblek passed the torch off to the seat next to him.

"Ha, ha! They are indeed sneaky- as they would well need to be, for if they should dare show their faces out in the open, why I'd-" Knowing how to coral his comrades, all it took was a look from Ozpin to get the man to his point. "Ah-yes, well, they covered their tracks well, but there were without a doubt signs of occupation in the lower sections of the city. Not enough to tell us how many had been encamped there or when they moved, I am afraid. Whatever careless tidbits they might have overlooked had been trampled by the Grimm by the time we got there. Hmph! Such a problem I never encountered during my time in the Veldt. Now there was a marvelous hunt!"

"What beasts had been above for the most part all seemed to have moved underground and crowded into the tunnels." Ooblek added to prevent another tangent. "Clearly, not by accident."

"Agreed." Visibly approving with a nod, Ozpin turned his thoughts inwards as he pontificated out loud. "I had considered having Ironwood billet his forces there. But I see that is ill-advised. Pity, the subways, had they been intact would have been ideal for ferrying troops into the city had there been unexpected complications."

"This was probably their own intentions." From over Ozpin's shoulder, Glynda was still focused on scanning her tablet which held a strategic map of Vale and surrounding territories. "It might very well have succeeded. As it stands now, I would suggest collapsing them while we have the chance. The Grimm are getting even more aggressive towards Vale and Beacon in particular lately. Why they abandoned this plan of action though is strange."

"Perhaps not all of Her forces are as consolidated as we thought?" Ooblek put forth. "Such has been the case with many legitimate alliances, let alone this unholy one."

"I had always thought that such undertakings were beyond Roman's capacity, or even desire. It would make sense if he were having cold feet." Thinking twice, Ozpin rolled his head back and forth on his shoulders. "Although, he is also unlikely to provoke their ire, so I doubt he would attempt to double-cross whomever Salem sent to represent her."

"-Unless he thought he would have a better chance of surviving." Peter Port reasoned heavily. "Such is the rationale with opportunistic prey. They will bite their own leg off if it means escaping a trap."

"This is still just speculation." Glynda reminded them all, setting down her work to highlight her focus. "It is just as likely that there is contention within the White Fang over working with humans."

"Very true." All agreed on this point which unfortunately robbed them of most avenues of thought. "In any case, we shall all be keeping our ears close to the ground for anything unusual, especially during the festival."

"Yes," Standing up immediately when he sensed the meeting was over, Ooblek was never one to waste a moment. "Unfortunately, I do not believe we can count on the repetition of history to help us this time. -I do wonder if Bruno is enjoying the coffee I sent him…"

* * *

*Achoo!*

"Gesundheit."

"Thanks, *Sniff*."

After this exchange, Basayev went back to writing in his fluorescent yellow notebook as if nothing had changed. As if he was still the only living thing perched on that cusp of rocks just beneath the summit.

Saying nothing, Winter may have been slightly embarrassed- annoyed with herself. If it weren't for these two giveaways, she might have passed right by the man as he reclined in the crag of two boulders. His jacket with its discoloration and stains proved to be almost the perfect camouflage for this terrane.

Really though, she wasn't bothered. She had accepted that Basayev was pretty good at disappearing when he wanted to. She even suspected that the vague trail of parted grass she'd followed today had been intentionally provided by him.

Whatever reservations she had were left behind in the camp, far below the cloud line.

"It's beautiful up here."

"Mm."

Quiet too, which was another reason to like it. Here above the fog, one could at last see the sun along with the eight other 'Teeth' jabbing up out of a foamy sea. It was a surreal sight that neither words nor even a camera could truly capture.

"Are you drawing it?" In the dearth of conversation, she noticed that he kept glancing between the tiny gap under the rim of his glasses and the faraway horizon.

"Sketching." Rubbing his thumb over a pencil-mark to blend the lines. "I'm not very good, but it helps the memory when you do this. More so than a photograph."

"That's true. May I see it?"

"Maybe," Satisfied enough, he shut the book with a light clap. "Someday."

She didn't press the issue and settled for continuing to look at the scenery, unsure of when she'd get another chance to just stand here and call it her job.

"This rock, it's granite, you know?" She did, but failed to grasp the significance of the seemingly irrelevant fact. "It's strange, because one would expect islands like these to be basalt. It means that they, too, are Remnants. Pieces of some long-forgotten continent."

Picking up a rock, he looked at it and weighed it in his hands. Contemplated the pits and hackly surface as if he were judging a human heart before casting aside where it skittered down the steep cliff to his right.

"I see," -Meaning that she understood what he was saying, not why. Though she listened to the free info regardless, trying to glean a meaning. Maybe he was trying her logic, or perhaps testing her memory to see if she remembered the little geology they had learned in class together.

"I remember you now." She said after a silence in which he offered her nothing else and in which she could not decipher his intent. "Three seats down. The first day I sat next to you, and then my father found out and _ordered_ me to move."

"Your father also probably doesn't remember who I am. Although, that seems to be something else we share." Bruno had been cleaning his glasses until that point but paused for a moment of regret. "I'm sorry."

"You're not wrong."

"But that doesn't make it right. I should know more than anyone. The past is vindictive, isn't it?"

"You were from the Blancs." It had been the first time she'd seen the man genuinely surprised with anything. Even when the Faunus boy almost fell through the docks, he had simply reacted. It would have been funny, except for the fact that he nearly fell over the precarious edge on the other side of his perch. Actually, it was still funny, but she chose to smirk quietly lest she surprise him again. "I told you that I remembered."

It was hard to forget, though she somehow had. Even if their name meant "White", the mountainous region was a bloody stain on Atlas' history. Mantel had fought a decade-long conquest which only ended after the native population was halved, the rest being scattered to the arctic winds with a sizeable chunk ending up in the capital with no other place to go.

"I don't think I ever told anyone that." He sighed, regaining his balance and readjusting his glasses which had slipped almost as far as he did. "Though I suppose it's pretty obvious."

Winter nodded sadly. Everything about him screamed foreigner to her biased perception. Basayev was not a common name in Atlas and for good reason. Anyone who had it was driven out of town or strung up by the neck. Emigrants from the Blancs had been 'encouraged' to change their names to better blend in, and the Atlesian government encouraged this cultural amnesia for two populations who wanted nothing more than to forget.

"Back then, I probably deluded myself into thinking I would have a hard time being a Schnee in a public military academy. When for you, it must have been so much worse." Her white hair was as much a giveaway as his darker skin and swarthiness which he kept neatly at bay. However, his features were almost as reviled in Atlas as a lion's tail or dog ears.

"I don't care about that." He declared without hesitation and in such a way as to make the rocks tremble. "I told you: I'm not your enemy. I won't be defined by the past."

And what was his relation to history, to that infamous Basayev who sacrificed thousands for his ideal of independence? A cousin, nephew, son? Any of these titles would be a much harder legacy to live down than 'daughter of Jacques Schnee'. It made sense why he enlisted in Vale, though she was surprised he had made it as far as he had.

Small men sometimes cast large shadows, but Basayev wanted none of that.

"They've started."

It was then that she realized that the stones hadn't stopped trembling after his announcement. Now they were vibrating, leaping off the flat surfaces to roll down the steep hill. Deep rumbles like thunder emanated from beneath the clouds, and eventually she could even see the muted flashes like lightning. If she hadn't known what was happening, it would be as if Hell were burbling up from the center of the earth and they were staying just above the floodwaters.

"Please, do not pity me." Only the second thing he'd asked of her, and another thing she was too happy to accede. To her mild surprise, he stood up even though the earth still shook.

"It'll be over soon."

* * *

"So… It's over? We're screwed?"

The glare formed in reply threatened to end him, to make him nothing more than an ashy shadow upon that concrete wall. You'd think he would have learned by now. The only other person there would have been reiterating this if only her mouth weren't parted in mute horror, watching their 'mistress' stalk up to him with deadly poise.

"Oh no, my dear boy." The hand she laid on his cheek burned, but it was no worse than that her gaze which dried out his very soul. "Not by a longshot."

Patting his cheek nearly sent him to his knees, Mercury repressed a hiss and whatever snide remarks he might have been tempted to form.

"This has simply been a… series of unfortunate setbacks. The truth is that nothing can stop history." Such confidence was easy for her to outwardly display and even believe herself, for her to perpetuate that fear. "We still have Adam and the White Fang dancing to our tune, and that's all that matters. Roman would have become redundant soon enough, anyway."

"But Cinder, what are we going to do about him?" Worrying more about the question rather than the answer, Emerald muddled through both with a look of worry. "We can't let him go. Don't we need the Dust crystal he has to control Atlas' robots?"

"We can get on without it. There are still… other measures in place." Cinder asserted with a scowl, pacing the room which did nothing for her subordinates' peace of mind. "-But we obviously can't let him just get away scot-free."

"Let me deal with Torchwick." Picking himself up, Mercury's smile tugged painfully at the scalded pink flesh on his cheek which only further fueled his bloodlust. "I'll find him, don't you worry."

"I'd be scared if I didn't already know that you'd have trouble finding your way out of a cardboard box, Kiddo." Not quite the devil, but the lesser demon of their conversation waltzed into their hideout as if it were all business as usual. "And really- I am quite insulted that you think I'd skip out like that. Oh, I know I'm a coward. But that also means that I'm not likely to burn any bridges I've got." Shooting a careful eye at Cinder, just to make sure that she understood and wasn't about to attack him. "… I know better than to play with fire."

"Where have you been?" More likely upset at being made a fool than for his delay, Roman hurried with a reply to the woman.

"You mean after nearly getting killed in that deathtrap? Laying low, taking care of some personal business while down there."

"Answer the damn question you piece of-"

"Mercury." Pain a poignant reminder, the silver-haired teen backed off and reeled in his desire to maim. Cinder meanwhile turned back to the redhead who she saw was rightfully wary being in the lion's den. Yet he had returned. "As long as you are prepared for tomorrow night."

"I am at your _disposal_ my lady." Exposing a neck with a bow, Roman did not hide his sarcasm or the fact that he knew what had been said about him.

"Good." Pretending she didn't hear it, Cinder knew that she still held the man by the throat anyway, and he too would get what was coming eventually. "Whoever Ozpin has monitoring the security is good. We couldn't risk infiltrating the tournament, so we will need to be a little more… heavy handed in our approach." At last there was something pleasing to Mercury. "So be sure to bring your little toy, Roman."

Good that he was still bowing, because one of the few things Roman couldn't stand was when such insults were levied against Neo. Lips curled back into a sneer like a rabid dog. This was the true difference between man and beast- one could hide their feelings. Fortunately, he didn't need to for long.

"Are you sure he can handle it?" Doubt made all the worse by the green-haired girl who asked it in all genuineness. "I wouldn't want him standing as the only thing between us and getting caught. What if he leaves us high and dry? Perhaps I should accompany them on this."

Cinder was about to contradict Emerald with the case that they still needed her anonymous. She was very shocked when the cowardly crook interrupted her, so much so that she couldn't be upset.

"Oh, I wouldn't worry about that." It was necessary to show his subservience to Cinder, but luckily her brats were free for the pickings. " **You** might be disposable, but I have my own reasons for sticking around and seeing things done right. Believe it or not, I still have **some** pride left. Neo and I both owe Little Red some payback."

"And **you** think you're up to it?" The idea was truly humorous to Mercury. "Last I recall, she kicked your ass 2 to zip."

"You're more than welcome to try. Just please, no hard feelings when I step over your corpse to finish the job."

"Me? You're the only one around here who's dead-weight-"

"Enough," While infuriated that he was always the one being cutoff, Mercury knew the entirety of his fury was nothing compared to what was imbued in that one word.

"Roman wants to make up for his mistakes? Fine. I'll believe it when I see it."

* * *

"This is… nice."

Not what she would have chosen, either the word or the decorations it described. However, after a little while of growing accustomed to it, she decided that it fit well enough. Unlike her dress, which felt like a straitjacket at the same time it exposed more flesh than she ever remembered having.

"What do you think, Ruby?"

Biased by her thoughts on attire, Ruby tried to forget about this for the time being and soak in her surroundings. What had been their great hall was transformed for the festivities, garnished in such a way that one would be hard-pressed to recognize it. The style was invocative of Mistral, familiar, even if she was sure that she had never seen it before. Perhaps out of a picture book, a fantasy world long in the past. Soft, flickering light from paper lanterns strung up by the rafters went a long way to making it feel ephemeral and surreal.

"I gather that team CFVY of second year was supposed to be in charge of it," Appearing only slightly more at ease than Ruby herself, Weiss fidgeted, looking for something to talk about. "But then they got delayed on a mission, and the duty was supposed to fall to us." Wincing as she stumbled upon this revelation buried in haste. "In the end, I guess Ozpin got Ms. Koharu to do it."

"Who cares how it's dressed? I want to know if this school can party!"

"Gah! Yang, don't sneak up on us like that!"

"Sorry Weiss," Wearing a grin that said everything but, Yang pressed up to the two whilst dragging a harried Blake. The dark-haired woman busy trying to straighten herself out with one hand while the other was locked in the blonde's grip. "What's up, are you having fun yet?"

Weiss wrinkled her nose to express displeasure with the idea, or perhaps the wording. Or, it could have even been the fact that her only company had thus far been her captain and partner as they both loitered by the punch bowl without any idea of what to do with themselves, being otherwise unaccompanied.

"Well duh," Yang nudged the tense girl. "Of course it's going to be like that if you just keep hiding back here. Why don't you wander and find someone to talk to? Or just go out there and dance? -By the way, what's the music?"

"The What." Finally managing to fix her shoulder-strap which had become twisted in haste, Blake answered the blonde curtly, still somewhat annoyed at being the last one to the shower.

"The band."

"The What."

"I want to know who's playing."

"The. What."

"C'mon Blake, I'm sorry I took so long, but do you really have to be this difficult?"

"The name of the band is 'the What'." Finally deciding to take pity on the blonde, Weiss supplied the clarification. "Some old-school rock band that Ozpin picked out, I think. Ms. Koharu apparently wanted to play some kind of Junk music instead."

"I think it's pronounced 'Gunka'." Blake corrected. "Although, from what Shikamaru has said, it _is_ junk."

"For a bunch of old-guys, they're not bad." Standing on her tiptoes in high-heals to see over the crowd, Yang was unknowingly giving a few of them a sight as her slit-dress slid further up her leg.

"Glad you approve."

"Hey, Oz! What'cha doing here?" Conservative as always, all Ozpin needed to express was done with a single raised eyebrow, his hands folded behind a suit that was little different than the one he always wore every day to… school. "Erm, never mind."

"At the moment, I think I am getting a glass of punch. Perhaps one of those cheese wedges too if I am feeling so bold." Sarcasm as rich as the brownies which Ruby had tested for quality-control only minutes before. "After that, I imagine that I will go back to talking with the other adults while we keep an eye on things."

"What about the party?" Switching her discontent to her eyebrows, Weiss was worried for the headmaster who looked almost as tired as they did, day after day. "I'd hate to think that we were enjoying ourselves while everyone else is working."

"I can enjoy the band just fine, I won't be needing hearing aids just yet. That, and my days of dancing in the mosh pit ended a long time ago." He placated them with a smile. True to his word, reaching over and ladling himself a cup of the sticky violet drink from which he took a clearly refreshing gulp. "Besides, I don't think my song has come up yet."

"I'll believe it when I see it, Oz. I think I could rock to this. C'mon Ruby-"

"-Wait, what?!" Having let go of her partner, now Yang had a hand free to scoop up her sister and carry the slight girl towards where some of the students had picked up the beat. Leaving their headmaster and team bemused and amused in that order. "No-no-no-no- I- I think I twisted my ankle! It's okay though, I don't want to! Really, I'm fine here!"

"Awe, are you saying that you don't want to dance with me?" Halting her efforts for a moment, Yang presented a voluptuous pout. It was so different than her own, accentuating her sister's fuller lips, crossed arms which drew attention to her more womanly shape; even the confidence with which she wore this expression like that low-cut dress. Everything about Yang was so much more natural in this setting, making it impossible for Ruby to keep ignoring her own sense of dislocation. "Are you really going to make me go all alone? I don't have a date myself, and yet you'd leave your own sister high and dry."

And yet it was guaranteed that Yang was a good deal better off by herself without Ruby to drag her down. Already the young men were drawn to her ripe figure hanging just outside the dancefloor, heedless of their own unwittingly jilted dates.

' _And, so what?'_ The needle hopped the record, reality invading during that brief skip in the music. _'Ruby, I spent a lot of my life comparing myself to others, trying to get people to accept me. You don't need to worry about that, you've already got so many. I'm not telling you to do something that you don't want to, but you shouldn't let anything hold you back. Not other people, not embarrassment, not even whatever responsibilities you think you have, and certainly not yourself. It might just be one night, but it's_ _ **only**_ _a night.'_

One night that they'd never get back. What she wouldn't give to have another night with her mother again. Would she ever be feeling that way about anyone else?

' _And I promise, I'm not going anywhere.'_

"Alright."

But by the time she had reached the threshold of courage and the dancefloor proper, the band had dropped into a slower pace. The lead guitarist had gone from hopping around stage like a man half his age, to an almost senile stoop where he picked a slow and invocative scale all alone. When he sang, it was in a sweet tone made hollow by the excoriation of life and rich with its experience.

"~No one knows what it's like

To be the bad man

To be the sad man

Behind blue eyes

And no one knows what it's like

To be hated

To be fated to telling only lies~"

Uncannily how she'd known what he was singing about. She'd only seen a pair of eyes like that once in a place not dissimilar to this: Flickering darkness, an undefined yearning in a dream that wasn't a dream. So close to people she loved.

"~But my dreams they aren't as empty

As my conscience seems to be

I have hours, only lonely

My love is vengeance

That's never free~"

Like many others, Yang had heard the shift and tried to sway to the slow rhythm, to drag her sister into the melody. But the twang was more for the heart than the feet, and she unknowingly just pulled Ruby closer.

"~No one knows what its' like

To feel these feelings like I do

And I blame you

No one bites back as hard

On their anger, none of my pain and woe

Can show through~"

Having already secured herself a glass of something not quite as sweet and a plate of treats to compensate for that, Blake was going to find a relatively secluded place remain unobtrusive, listen to the music and possibly play a game of Shogi against Shikamaru. But the first lines had hit her before she even left the concessions table, and she was frozen next to Weiss whose enchantment relaxed the mounting anxiety on her face.

"~But my dreams, they aren't as empty

As my conscience seems to be

I have hours, only lonely

My love is vengeance

That's never free~"

It was safe to say that the swell caught them all by surprise, lifted their hearts which had been tied to that downtrodden dirge. Part of the same narrative, but coming alive, expressing itself with the bass and the drums and the other bandmembers chiming in their compassion.

"~When my fist clenches crack it open!

Before I use it and lose my cool

When I smile, tell me some bad news

Before I laugh and act like a fool

And if I swallow anything evil

Put your finger down my throat

And if I shiver please give me a blanket

Keep me warm let me wear your coat~"

The chorus came in one more time, but its laments had been lost to the mounting freneticism as the song morphed and evolved underneath the transformed dancers- possibly out of the control of the band themselves as they seamlessly delved into another tune without pause. Maybe it was still part of the same overarching story, or maybe it had been an isolated highlight, low-point, inimitable event.

Whatever it might have been, they enjoyed while it lasted. Until the present, the future, became history.

* * *

At last it seemed Spring had arrived and the cool night air- not cold- felt wonderful on her flushed face. Bare feet carried her headlong onto the balcony, into the darkness where she twirled off the last of the excitement. Halted by the railing, Ruby looked back upon the festivities framed under the arching gables as a slideshow of life, a flipbook of her past months in Beacon.

There was Weiss, Blake, her sister, Ozpin, Ms. Goodwitch, Nora, Ren, Pyrrha, Jaune… in a dress for some reason. Everyone was there, illuminated by some internal glow and just beyond her fingertips. Some were still dancing to the music which spilled out of cracks and closed doors, others talking in silent animation. All carefree, all alive.

"…Normal knees…"

She whispered the phrase as if it might scare away this tenuous reality. This was normal, this fragile and precious thing.

' _And are you sure that's what you want?'_

Strangely enough, this voice had become accustomed of her reality, even though no one would ever claim it was 'normal'. Yet she would never give it up, she would protect the colored gem which housed it just as vehemently as the tinted faces behind the glass windows.

"No," Talking as much to herself as to it, the empty night did not mind. "Just… sometimes I wish…"

What did she wish? The yearning was unknown, an ache hidden by muscles which strained with the effort of determination. Setting her shoes down, she rubbed a callused hand over her battered corpse, accounting for all the pains of flesh. Straying to her wrist brought an acute agony that she could not suffer silently, whimper piercing that crisp air.

' _I'm so sorry Ruby.'_

What more could he say? When words were all he had, he was made to see just how feeble things they were.

"For what?" Through clenched teeth she tried to reclaim that lightheartedness. _"You saved my life."_

' _But I-'_

And once again, there was nothing to be said. She could already see through his guilt; conversely, he knew what she meant as well, going beyond the bleeding wrist to the broken heart. In life, he had tried to fill up to the void with endless chatter which ultimately conveyed no understanding. Here, now, he had found someone who knew him better than he knew himself.

" _Life always comes with challenges, even the normal kind."_ She reminded him, dredging up a conversation from the past, and dreaming a reality which had never happened. She could imagine a 'normal life' which Naruto nor any of the others had existed. And from where she stood now, she found it lacking. _"We just have to learn to roll with the punches, right?"_

' _Right.'_

Could she, though? Wrapping her arms around the disguised bruises and repressing a shiver as the radiant heat finally abandoned her. The cold of the night had creeped in, reminding her that nothing lasts.

' _That better?'_

Dependable as death, Naruto came to her aid before she even realized the need. Convective warmth radiated from her chest and flowed over her skin, wrapping her in a sensation more comfortable than her cloak fresh out of the dryer.

"Thanks. I don't know what I'd do without you."

After all this time the sincerity of this statement had not diminished. So long as he was around, he would never convince her otherwise. It would always be a fantasy that she could stand on her own two feet.

' _Ruby, without you I am nothing. I would still be just sitting on a shelf gathering dust… no pun intended. I would be a decoration- or worse, a tool for someone who would use me for their own purposes. You've given me something I thought I didn't deserved, something I dared not hope for. A second chance to do some good. And for that, I would give anything- everything. My knowledge, my strength, what is left of my life. All of it is yours, given freely.'_

In this pledge stirred his remnant determination, the last of what made him Naruto Uzumaki. It might have killed whatever jovial mood that had been carried over from the party, but it was something that needed to be said, something that needed to be done as an act of his freewill.

"… Then, would you dance with me?"

Old habits die hard, and so he tried to blink eyes that weren't there.

'… _Um, what?'_

"You're right, I don't know why I'm asking." Ruby stated sounding somewhat forlorn. At least, before she hopped off the railing and flicked his crystal. "Come on, get out here, you."

' _Seriously? You know it's not real.'_

" _Quit delaying, I don't know how many songs those guys have left in them."_ The band might have been surprisingly good, but they were still past their prime and were not expected to keep up with teenage huntresses and huntsmen.

' _Alright, alright-' "And no toads this time."_

The thought had crossed his mind- but no more than a flicker. A flicker which died behind the spark of inception, as he needed all his concentration just to maintain the illusion. Genjutsu was still far from his forte, but doing the impossible is what Naruto lived for.

"So…" Slow to form, when it arrived the sight struck her like a blow, and she breathed in sharp for lungs which had the air knocked out of them. "That's what you really look like, huh?"

Only seeing it once hadn't made it easier to forget, and seeing it now made it no easier to believe. The whisker-marks on his cheeks were as fake as the smirk which tugged at them. Yet to Ruby, it was as she'd always dreamed, a princely visage that she had to drag from the depths of hell.

' _As near as I can remember, yeah.'_ As if he hadn't spent millennia staring at that unforgiving smile. _'The outfit I kind of just made up on the spot.'_

A fact which in no way made it any less tangible nor more surreal. Nor did the ethereal glow from the Berlin-blue suit do anything to detract or even enhance those eyes which were every bit as lonesome as described.

It wasn't fair.

' _Well?'_ Him asking with all the time in the world, and herself… _'Did you want to dance, or not?'_

It wasn't fair, even the musicians had read the scene and started plucking a slow melody to finish out the night. Perfection, and there she was standing in bare feet, in a dress that she might never fill out. Wasted silk, wasted flesh-

"Ow!" She rubbed her forehead where he flicked it. Illusory he might have been, but to her, he was very real.

' _Quit talking down to yourself.'_ While he admonished her, his smirk had become an endearing smile that she knew she wanted- _needed_ to see more of. She desired that familiar touch when he poked her again and removed the pain. _'Only I can do that, remember?'_

She mumbled something so quietly that it was beneath even the muffled sound of music coming through the walls.

' _What was that?'_ He knew, but it was a guilty pleasure to watch her squirm, fidget on the balls of her feet left and right under his mirthful gaze.

"…I don't know how. I was hoping you could teach me." Doubtlessly, Yang would have sprung at the chance to teach her baby sister an 'adult' skill, but this was the very reason she didn't want to ask her. Or, the reason she was admitting to herself.

' _And what makes you think_ _ **I**_ _know how?'_

She nearly choked on embarrassment, wilted under his flare of laughter.

' _Here, I may not be the best, but I picked up a thing or two.'_ As well as herself, with a gentle word and hand, intertwining with her own. _'Ready?'_

No, she wouldn't be, but went along with it anyway because the night was quickly slipping away like those phantom hands through her fingertips. Rolling with the punches, with the music as it tumbled them across the balcony, she bobbed and weaved with the ebb and flow.

' _To anyone else, this might look pretty weird, you know?'_

If anyone were to bother looking away from the light, they'd see Ruby dancing by her lonesome, twirling languidly in delusion. It was fake, a fantasy- that she could admit. She could also admit that for once, she didn't care.

' _I'm glad.'_

As was she. Even though she knew it wouldn't last.

And of course, it didn't. The memory itself would become muddled, a swirl of colors and emotions the only thing which would last for posterity. Aquamarine mixed into a black-cherry passion, producing only a desire for that royal-purple life which few could ever achieve.

' _There, that wasn't so bad, was it?'_ Music and moment faded, and they came to a jolting halt.

"Thank you."

He could feel as well as hear the despondency in her voice. It was something he knew well but pretended he didn't recognize, reaching out to perk up her mood and tussle her hair like his own sensei had once done.

' _I'm proud of you, you know that? And I know the others are as well.'_ He stopped, even though he probably could have gone on forever. _'And I know you know it too, even if you have to be reminded of it from time to time.'_

As well as he had to remind himself that this wasn't real when she shot past and wrapped her own arms around him- around the hollow projection in which he placed his hopes and guilt. Oh, how hard it was when he knew the dampness burrowing into his chest, felt the longing for human touch rending his soul.

And what would it hurt to pretend for just a moment longer? Nothing would change if instead of pretending to pat her head he rested his chin there, reciprocated her gesture and enveloped her in more of the warmth he radiated.

"-ruto, I-"

He already knew what she was trying to say even if it was stifled by her emotion. He already knew her every thought forward and backwards. And yet, that did not mean what she was trying to say wasn't important.

' _I know.'_ Overjoyed and devastated by this knowledge in the same breath. _'Ruby…'_

'… _Someone's out there.'_

Already fleeting, the scene was banished as quickly as Ruby spun around and back into reality, just in time to see something else flicker in and out of existence in the dark.

It took no time to make a decision, slightly longer to figure out whether she wanted to try wearing her high-heels.

' _Be careful Ruby, you don't even have your weapon.'_ Back in his container and berating himself for not noticing the intrusion sooner, Naruto intended to make up for this negligence.

" _You're my dagger, remember?"_ Without regrets, Ruby hopped up onto the banister and launched herself into the darkness.

' _I remember.'_ Finding gratification in this, even as he scanned the night for their mysterious intruder. _'Lantern too. Even still, be extra careful. Whoever they are is moving quickly and with purpose, clearly they aren't amateurs.'_

" _Got it."_ She could already feel it, not needing his guidance. This person was… sticky. Voracious. A firestorm which sucked in everything it needed to burn and consumed everything which stood in their way. _"What do you think they want?"_

' _Nothing good.'_ This went without saying, but meant that Naruto had no more idea than she. _'Incoming!'_

Nothing good did not preclude anything worse, and the sudden appearance of a second assassin definitely counted towards a bad night. However, Ruby was familiar with this song and dance, thus was able to dodge the initial strike pouncing down on her from above. In fact, after dodging another couple of slashes which missed her by a narrow margin, she realized that she was **very** familiar with this particular dance.

"Neo."

Breaking off the surprise assault to give a mocking curtsy, it was clear that the two could see one another even in the near-abject darkness. There was no spare moment to think of the ramifications though, as Ruby found herself up against a decidedly deadly opponent without a proper weapon.

'Proper' being the key word as she had already removed her necklace and was gripping the formidable crystal in her left hand. It was because of their last encounter that she hesitated to use her dominant right hand. Pain and memory still lingered, boiled over from her head and into her wrist.

"What are you doing here?"

Little chance that the girl would or even could answer, but Neo gestured with an all-too-familiar fleer at her left hand.

"No, I'm not handing him over."

In response, Neo made a swipe with her blade over her own left hand, spelling out exactly what she would do without uttering a single word.

"Not going to happen this time."

Obviously, Roman's partner didn't believe it, and Ruby could hardly blame her. She could hardly believe herself, even as she felt Naruto's Chakra burble out of confinement and spread over her arm into a blade as honed as the one staring her down.

Her first real surprise came when Neo turned her gaze towards her arm, as if she could see the invisible blade of wind now coating her appendage. True, the girl could see illusions, but had previously proven herself susceptible to those cast by Charka.

The second surprise was when she outright laughed- or as nearly as she could which came out as a parched rasp like someone rubbing the bones of the dead together trying to start of a fire. Eventually Neo stopped trying and pulled out a piece of flint- a stone so crystal clear that it looked black against the backdrop of the night and her soul. She let it dangle there mockingly on a necklace similar to Ruby's, swinging back and forth and counting the second which passed in silence.

Last and most fatal, the wind Chakra that Naruto had been controlling for her use dispersed. It took with it the faint rush of air and left her with nothing but her own heart beating in her ears.

" _Naruto?"_ She called to him, _"What's going on."_

' _No, this- this can't be.'_

' _Naruto?'_

Ruby heard it, and it wasn't her voice this time. Perhaps she recognized it on some subconscious level, for it sent chills up her spine. Though Naruto had also ceased the flow of heat- stopped everything as that one word hit him like a paralyzing blow.

' _Naruto? Naruto… he's here, isn't he? Been waiting… searching… waiting… long time. Impossibly long… it hurts… need Naruto…'_

"Who is that? Who are you?" While confronting with these words, Ruby was already shifting her weight to her back foot in case she had to make a break in the other direction.

' _Who? I am… I am his. I am nothing without Naruto.'_

' _No, that's not true.'_ Ruby froze as she heard a tone that heretofore had been reserved for her alone. _'No, no, no. You've always been your own person… you were always such an amazing person. But, I failed you too,_

' _Hinata.'_

* * *

 **Song is: Behind Blue Eyes by 'the Who'. (obviously relates to the little joke in there, I couldn't help myself) (P.S. if you listen to one album by this band, Quadrophenia is still one of the most pertinent suite of songs to date, if you listen right).**


	15. Cenozoic: Eocene

**Happy New Years*!**

 ***Having a good year is not guaranteed and entirely dependent on the user.**

 **-But don't worry, there's always Lunar New Year to get things right.**

* * *

" _What was she, to you?"_

' _A…friend. Another one I let down.'_

There was more, something there that she didn't understand, and something else she was all too familiar with. It was enough to know that this wasn't a conversation, but a eulogy. How long had it been since she had been that girl? How many words had been wasted, cast into that black pit of despair?

" _You haven't let anyone down yet, Naruto."_ Trying to assure him without any assurance that these words would ever reach. Would they too be lost?

' _Naruto-kun… it really is you…'_

' _Hinata, I am so sorry…'_

" _Now's not the time for apologies."_ Ruby urged, warily eyeing her adversary who remained fixed, painted on the backdrop of night with a beguiling smile that knew far too much as well.

Naruto knew she was right, but he could no more ignore the call than Ruby could omit the imminent threat standing across from them. Time tried to make a fool of him once again, not realizing how much he was already.

' _She needs my help.'_

" _And we will,"_ Despite all sincerity and earnest, she was losing and knew it. Neo had yet to lift a finger other than that which was wrapped around the one called Hinata. _"But right now,_ _ **I**_ _need your help. I need you to stay with me here!"_

' _He left…'_ Ruby winced at this spirit reaching from beyond the grave to take Naruto from her, and incidentally clawing at her heart. _'…but I knew he would return. Naruto-kun… never goes back on his word.'_

' _Yeah… I used to think that too.'_

" _-You did! You will!"_ Screaming at her insides, Ruby found herself competing with the instinct to flee, with a nostalgia that wanted to smother everything in a cover of ennui. Her own heart strained laboriously within her chest that felt too heavy, on and off, dead or alive between the beats. _"Right now, you have to keep your other promises!"_

 _You promised to stay with me._

Leveraging such guilt hurt her almost as much as him, almost as much as Neo's blade would sliding beneath her skin. But she could bear it. A broken heart could be mended, but there was little to do for a punctured one.

' _In my heart… He was… the one thing keeping me going… all those years.'_

Swallowing hard, her mouth was so dry it was if she were already dead and talking up through a layer of dirt. No one was listening to her, except for her adversary who was very much alive and mocking her plight. The restless spirit she had resurrected from another black pit still dangling from an identical necklace.

Neo commenced her attack, but the sword swings were nothing compared to that voice. The strikes as they whooshed by her ear felt lazy, and it was clear Neo was perfectly content to let the words rip her apart syllable by syllable.

' _Naruto-kun was our hero. He still is.'_

' _But… I let you die, along with so many others.'_

And if things continued as they were, Ruby might be the next victim. A thousand tiny cuts, like those against her once-virgin dress, would lash at her spirit. But she would survive humiliation; survive until Neo decided to end this farce.

' _I'm no one's hero.'_

" _So what?"_ Though she could dodge, neither of them could run away. Desperately, she urged them both to fight back. _"Since when do you need credit to do something good?!"_ Flashing above and behind Neo, Ruby tried to snatch the gemstone as it flailed but was teased out of her grip. _'I don't know who you're talking about, but that's not the Naruto I know! My friend doesn't let little stuff like this bother him. And most importantly, he doesn't give up!'_

' _I never gave up because… I knew he would come bac-'_

"Oh, shut up!" The dead deserved their respect, but Neo had already trespassed by invoking this poor girl. Ruby shot past the other girl, tripping her on the way and earning another breathy retort. "If you wanna live, you fight for it! We don't wait for people to rescue us!"

But her words continued to fall on deaf ears while the mute growled at her, silently vowing to deal real damage with the next pass.

"Are you sure that's still even your friend?"

Watching the ante being raised, Ruby wanted to know just what she was betting her life on. Perhaps that was a question she should have asked in the beginning, but she had always trusted him- she still did, implicitly. Though maybe she had misjudged this other as he had, overlaying a memory that was too good to be true.

' _That's her, I know it is. I could never forget.'_

"No, I don't think it is." Such desperate hope belonged only to the hopeless. Ruby had been there herself, at the edge of the precipice, long ago. But someone had been there to rescue her. "She's gone, Naruto."

' _You don't understand! Hinata, she-'_ A hope which never quite died, resurrected to haunt him. _'I failed her. I was supposed to- I never even…'_

"You're right, I probably don't understand." Though she did, and she felt all his pain. Bore it for him, because of him. "But whoever that is, it's not going to be who you remember. You see what's going on, right? This is all trying to distract you and keep you from helping me."

' _Naruto-kun will help me. He'll fix everything now that he's back.'_

"I can't do this alone," It had been a lifetime since she had spoken these words, no longer was she the lost little girl standing in front of her mother's grave. No longer was she carving out pieces of herself to fertilize a plot of ground. "-But I'll try. If that's what you need me to do, I'll try."

' _It's been such a long time… but now you're back.'_

"And we can try and help her too, I promise."

' _I'm so glad... I'm so glad I never gave up hope…'_

"-Though I'm still hoping you'll come to your senses."

'… _Because, now and forever…'_

"I'm not giving up on you,"

'… _I love you.'_

Between an instant and an eternity, Neo's blade rent both like the pointed hands of a clock. Blind admiration guided by the hand of vengeance, time sought out Ruby's heart and struck her. It all happened so quick, but the blood dribbled so slow. It welled up on that meticulously tiled ground, seeping through the hidden cracks.

"…And I'm not giving up on myself, either."

Blood forked and flowed over the tip of the sword which had sunk only a fingernail into flesh, halting upon something resolutely solid in that outstretched arm. Clenching her fist, Ruby cast aside the blade with a flick of the wrist in which it was imbedded.

Everything else came alive while Neo and her tool were correspondingly petrified, stiff like Ruby's ankle which had never quite healed normally. Twisting, she threw that abnormal limb and took out a leg, taking down her accoster like a table. There was a cracking of broken glass as Ruby followed up, driving her right into Neo's perplexed face. Though this time, it was her nose, and not Neo's illusion that was broken.

Both were sent reeling- both Neo and Naruto. One was silent, and Naruto called out a name- he wasn't exactly sure which, but it became clearer the further away their assassin skidded.

' _Hinata,'_ Hearing this, Neo peeled a messy smile off the ground on which her own crimson essence flowed. _'I'm sorry…'_ Ruby solidified her stance, cocking her hardened right back while pushing her other loaded fist to the fore.

'… _But I'm done saying sorry.'_

Acting upon this unspoken word, Ruby lanced forward. The que was obvious even for Neo, yet she barely had enough time to lift herself out of bewilderment before being bored out by a fist traveling near the speed of sound. The wind rushed by her ear, whisking away the bead of sweat threatening to fall, and making her hair stand on end with the static charge.

' _I'm not sure if I can ask for forgiveness.'_ No response came from the other team, only a snarl on the living face of death. _'I just know that I don't want to have a reason to, ever again.'_

Gripping their respective champions, they stood as reflections in a black mirror for all of a heartbeat. One taking it all in, the other pushing it all back out.

Neo suddenly spirited in front of Ruby who had no choice to block with her arm which yet remembered its grudge against the other girl. It tingled, more than it should have. Sensation in her appendage had been dulled ever since that day, but this was like a solid hammer of numbness pounding away at her skeleton.

Yet she held, allowing the shallow cut against the back of her arm while she aimed a retaliation under Neo's exposed ribcage. Prepared for her own strike to fail, Neo swallowed the blow in a blizzard of glassy images. Reappearing in Ruby's blind spot she was ready to hamstring her target. But Ruby had already shallowly hopped above her and the blade, lashing out with that frustrating left leg.

Breaking hard, Neo narrowly missed her strike and was narrowly missed in turn. Lucky, in that her nose was already crooked, and she could smell nothing but iron and feel naught but vengeance. Though her paltry luck would not hold as Ruby lunged at her, grabbing both hilt and blade with a seemingly impenetrable hand and drove a knee into her gut.

She screamed silently against the night which was equally quiet, the sounds of the party long faded away in the distance. Neo tried to wrench her hand free from the rock-hard clutch it was in. It slipped free right before Ruby snapped her elbow, the grip lubricated by the selfsame lifeblood now flowing freely and decorating her maroon dress.

Retreating to a safe distance, Neo nursed her stomach where a bruise was forming. She could already tell that it would be nasty and black, like the night, like her heart as she glared at her target. This was not the way things were supposed to go- this was not the girl she thought she was facing.

She reached up, snapped her nose back in place and made to correct whatever else was askew. Before it could crust, wiping off the drying blood on her crimson lips which curved into a smirk.

' _Naruto-kun… why?'_

' _Because I can't afford to make another mistake.'_ A pause in the fight to accommodate this exchange, Ruby bit down on her own pain to keep from spoiling it. _'…And… because you never really needed me.'_

Which was fine, because Neo didn't need the forgotten soul, either. She was strong enough on her own and itching for a fight. No one, not even the night gave her permission to break the solemnity. She ripped through it, zigzagging at Ruby with a grip on her weapon hard enough to form diamonds and a gleam in her eye enough to break them.

Stabs came one after another like the trill of a snake's tongue. Ruby dodged them all, accustomed to the pointillism style of combat from spars with Weiss and she proved a good deal faster than Neo had remembered. If anything, this made the assassin try harder, wetted the palette in anticipation for a blow that would finally draw more than a trickle of blood from the other girl.

She wanted to hear her scream.

' _What is this, Naruto-kun, I don't understand!'_

Tiring of the one-sided exchange, Ruby pushed back with nothing behind her, deflected with nothing but her lacerated arm starting to expose the gleaming bone underneath. But she struck out with the power of two.

' _I am protecting my friend,'_ Chakra conducted through wiry wisps of Aura like candyfloss forming a gauntlet glowing with a jellyfish's bioluminescence. _'Question is, what are_ _ **you**_ _doing?'_

Earlier, he had recognized the Jῡken within Neo's blunt tap. Then, he had witnessed the Eight-Trigrams Sixty-four Palms down the length of a blade. These were things he recognized, but never dared hope to see again- and especially not in this usurped and perverted form.

' _I-'_

Catching her opponent on the back foot, Ruby threw her flowering fist through the petite assassin. Collapsing upon herself in cascade of broken shards, one of Neo's pieces flew out behind Ruby and pierced straight through her spine to sprout from her chest. The sharp sliver of Neo evolved from just her smirk, reassembled with sword in hand still penetrating her enemy's breast.

At least, until Ruby disappeared too.

A glow behind her back made Neo think of an early dawn, but it was the sound which made her turn -If it could even be called that. The energy surging off Ruby's clenched fist had no color but looked a shade between blue and red. It had no form but occupied a presence. There was no sound which the creatures of night could discern, but it roused mice from their burrows and caused wolves to howl at the moon.

And this was going to hit her; there was no time for her to do anything about that.

But what Ruby's attack struck would not cave, would not shatter, would not give a tiny bit. A storm as white as snow but as hard as permafrost intercepted her. Her fist was flung in the direction of that spinning tempest and she was sent with it. She was thrown tumbling, the vaporous energy around her hand becoming a mirage once again.

Stopping with the grace of a ballerina who had just gone through the entire Nutcracker suite, Neo panted through lips which had been wiped of most their color. On the other hand, she stared at Ruby who was only now prying herself off the cracked tile and trying to figure out which was which. Neo chirped at this pathetic sight, her titter whistling wind in and out of her broken nose.

" _Laugh while you can,"_ Ruby thought bitterly. Though they had taken the brunt of the damage, both her wrist and ankle were feeling no worse than normal. It was everything else around them that seemed to be cracking under the pressure. _"We're not done yet."_

' _Not by a longshot.'_ Undying determination aside, he was still bothered. _'Though the sooner we finish up, the better.'_

Ruby acknowledged this, understanding that it had more to do with the abrupt silence on the other end than the original mission that was escaping their grasp.

' _You're hurt, Dummy,'_ One more reason that she had been neglecting.

Not an easy thing to hide when she was using that arm to lift her off the ground. The numerous gashes she had accumulated throughout the match were chewing through her arm like tires through mud. Excoriated flesh pared off every which-way, exposing bone not-quite-bone which looked more like-

Ruby hid the wound within the folds of her ruined dress, scooted up onto her knees and stared disapprovingly at Neo with eyes the same as the stars and moon overhead.

"It's just a scratch."

Neo was not refuting this. Neither was she smirking anymore, the sight of that wound before it was concealed had perplexed more than disturbed her. A fluorescent mystery glowed underneath mortal flesh and enticed her to learn more.

-Maybe she would just have to peel back the rest of the hide to see what lay underneath?

"Hey, you!" Dousing this thought with cold water, Neo blinked in nonplus at the abrupt shout. "No, not you. I'm talking to her!"

'… _M-me?'_

Smiling despite her own situation, Ruby knew there were others that were hurting far worse than she was.

"Yes. Hinata, right? I'm sorry this had to happen." She was, because even if this wasn't the worst of all possible events, it was pretty high up there. "But you have to understand, we're doing this for you too."

By cocking her head, Neo asked the question that was on everyone's lips but hadn't been spoken. Out of all of them, she was the only one who seemed to be talking sense without using a single word.

"Take a good look at who you're helping," Jabbing a finger that seemed as sharp as any blade. "If you really trust Naruto that much, why are you supporting the one he's against?"

' _I d-don't… I don't have a choice.'_

"Like hell!" Resisting the urge to clamp a hand over her own mouth, Ruby was in far too much discomfort for that. "We all have a choice, Hinata. We chose not to be victims, but to be our own heroes. Like me, right now, I'd really rather forget about all this and go back to the dance, to my team. But before I do that, I'm going to get up again and try to beat this hobgoblin."

And she did just this, albeit with some effort, and underneath the scornful glare of Neo who obviously resented the insult but had no means to retort.

"You're probably wondering whyyyyyyIIIIII'm dizzy. Phew, shouldn't have stood up so fast." While seeking her balance, Ruby let flash her gruesome injury. Beneath the flayed muscle, something else glowed crimson with a crystalline luster. "Anyways, I could run- probably should. But if I do, I'm letting people like her and whoever she's working with have free reign. They're going to hurt innocent people, my friends, and I can't let that happen. I won't. Not just because it's the right thing to do, but because I made a promise."

"Tsk- You really should be more careful about those verbal contracts, Red. Especially with things you're unlikely to deliver."

Not yet the worst of all possible worlds, the scales were rapidly being tipped in that direction. However, Ruby refused to let it show, ignored that Torchwick stood just behind her left shoulder with a rocket that could quite literally have her name on it. She had, in fact, predicted Roman's appearance a lot sooner, and was morbidly gratified that her instinct had proven correct.

"Not that agreements on paper are any better. I never trusted such things in the first place. Promissory notes, restraining orders, declarations of independence- meaningless words signed off by people who're trying to rewrite reality. Can you believe they used to _print_ money? Ha! Like I would trust a scrap of paper with someone's face on it any more than a candy wrapper. Both are just as empty.

"-They're just like your fantasies, Red. Words on paper. Hoping for a happy ending doesn't make it any more likely. Oh, you've done pretty well so far, I'll admit. Scrapping and scraping your way through things **way** above your head, but -spoiler alert- in the end we all die, and everything goes away just the same. Ain't a heroic death, either. There isn't any such thing. Death is just flat, splat, done. No one cares much about a smear on the ground."

Ruby looked at the blood and dirt scattered on the limestone promenade, tracing the smear to where it seamlessly met her bare legs and flowed into her spattered dress. Incidentally she noted a strange continuity between life and death, truth and lies in Roman's words.

"-I'm sorry," Breaking from the modernist art with a blink, she cocked her head over her shoulder and looked past Roman. "Did you say something?"

"You still think that someone's going to come rescue you." Regurgitating a smirk of amusement, the rest of Roman's face spelled disgust with eyebrows rapidly sewing themselves together and nose shrinking from an acidic bile. "Hope's an awful thing, Red. You're libel to end up trapped by it. Just like the rest of those poor buggers."

"Wow, and people say I talk a lot."

Something Roman would have expected the girl to say, but in a voice that was neither so blithe nor in so high a pitch to come from those cherry lips. It came from over his own shoulder, and Roman was struck by the realization that there was yet another person skulking about in the darkness he was unaware of- right before Ruby herself struck.

Being forewarned of the interruption, Ruby seized the moment of distraction. She capitalized on that unconscious twitch which brought the muzzle of his weapon a few degrees away from her. By the time he had swung back on target she was beyond his sight-picture and up in his face, twisting the cane out of his hands and bashing his chin upwards with her forehead. Before his body could even topple over, she had swept his legs out from underneath him and leveled his own weapon at his face.

Not about to let this transgression pass, Neo reacted nearly as quickly. Neglecting the newcomer, she darted straight at Ruby while the girl's attention was turned towards her partner. The time for games was long since over and there was no need for subtlety when Roman's life was in danger. So, she had no qualms about forcing out the energy dormant within that crystal.

It wasn't a smart idea to ignore the newcomer, but it would not be her undoing. Neo simply… came undone. Taking a single step found her leg shut off, then the other. One by one limbs quit functioning as she fell on the ground in a disconnected jumble of parts, what was in her hands skittering across the weathered tile. Only her eyes remained under her control, flickering between a rosy anger and a blank fear.

"Well…" Having yet to lift a finger, Galya strode forth into the moonlight and brushed back a strand of iridescent hair. "That was anticlimactic."

" _ **You!**_ " Unbothered even with his own weapon turned against him, the moment Roman caught sight of the metallically-colored nurse that all changed. A fury leapt up past the glass ceiling of contempt just as he struggled against Ruby pushing him down. "What are _**you**_ doing here?"

"Yes **, Me**." Turning her attention, Galya shifted her consideration upon that single word. "Um… have we met before? I know you're Roman Torchwick, and that pretty much explains what you're doing here. But I personally don't get out much because I'm a full-time employee, so I have no idea how you'd know me. Although, I am part of Beacon's staff, which is also why I'm here." Turning to Ruby then, Galya maintained an aloof demeanor whilst keeping the downed Neo in the corner of her eye. "I'm supposed to be a chaperone for the dance, and this young lady had a lot of people worried."

"-Erk, sorry…"

"You should be." With the scorn that only a concerned medical professional can deliver, Galya somehow cowed both girl and her companion under her stern gaze- but not Roman who continued to look like he was about to do something stupid and totally contradictory to his nature. "It took a while to find you. I'm not the best tracker and you disappeared so quickly that your team thought you were kidnapped. I suppose it was only luck that had me be the first to arrive. Which is probably a good thing, considering what your recklessness has managed to do to the arm I just fixed." Ruby was going to protest as she had before but was trampled by the vociferousness of the woman. "Although, first things first, I believe we ought to do something about these two. I see you have Roman well and secure, but what about this one? What is wrong with her?"

Ruby shrugged whilst keeping the weapon steady in her grip.

' _I think Hinata finally remembered how strong she was.'_

Whatever this meant was still a mystery to Ruby, but one which she had little worry over. Far more concerning was the absolute panic she glimpsed in Neo's eyes as the nurse approached her. It was a primal fear, as if with each step forward the woman took, she was exorcizing the malicious poltergeist within the girl and leaving a purely scared teenager alone in the husk. It looked like an agonizing process.

"Don't you dare touch her, you wit-!"

Whatever else Roman had to say was cut off as Ruby reacted to his sudden lunge and jammed the butt of the cane into his Adam's apple. Hands groping his throat, he writhed in mute agony like his accomplice so desperately wanted to do. Immobilized by some unknown force, Neo could only watch the other woman deliberately approach her. Panicked eyes squirmed in their sockets in place of a body that would not move to her command.

"Keep him steady." Galya commanded without so much as a glance at the distraction, continuing to kneel in front of Neo whose spirit appeared ready to fly out of her chest with how rapidly she was breathing. "Now then, let us see what is going on here…"

"Hey! I think they're over here!"

"Ruby!"

For this familiar call, Ruby allowed herself to look away and was happy she did. Her team sprinted forth from the darkness, flanked shortly by Ozpin and Glynda Goodwitch, along with Port, Oobleck and General Ironwood whose unmistakable profiles faded in from the distant lights.

Practically colliding with their captain, the adults funneled in behind team RWBY and encircled the scene. Ozpin was the first to come upon Galya whose hand was on the assassin's jugular, innocently checking her pulse.

"Report."

"Two perpetrators. One captured, one incapacitated. No known casualties. Minor injuries to Friendly." Chopping up her normal verbosity with a steel cleaver, Galya answered the headmaster with her own assessment of the situation.

"What is wrong with her?"

"Unknown." True to her nature, the nurse had already deployed a small medical kit and was shining a thumb-sized flashlight in the petrified girl's eyes. "Suspect was in this state upon arrival."

Ozpin gave a thrifty nod, serving both to acknowledge and to order one of his entourage to take custody of Neo.

"With all due respect headmaster," Galya glanced up, protesting the usurpation, "I'm not sure she should be moved. It's possible that she has a spinal injury."

"It is possible." The man acknowledged without sympathy, but with a concerned eye turned towards Ruby who no doubt looked a good deal more ragged. "However, our priority should be for our own people first and foremost."

"Yes, of course."

"No, it's okay, it's just a scratch! Really!" With attention of Roman taken over by an unamused Glynda, Ruby herself fell under the care of her teammates who would patently disagree with her. She needed a distraction. "-Wait! There was someone else! That's who I went after originally."

"Where?" Without breaking his stride even for Ruby's vague indication, Ozpin coolly picked out his two go-to choices. "Peter, Barty."

"Right, on it."

"Let the hunt begin, tally ho!"

Following the scent with a startling alacrity for such a stubby man, Ooblek struggled to keep up with Port. The History teacher had to take hasty strides with his longer legs simply to catch up. Before they even disappeared, Ozpin turned to the Atlesian general. "James, please return to the dance and oversee the students. This is best handled by people who know the campus."

"No need to explain." Yet looking bitter about it, Ironwood about-faced smartly and made double-time back to the Great Hall.

"Now then-" "Ruby, you're hurt!" Attention had never quite left her, but it became vocal after her teammates calmed enough to take a step back. Then they saw the damage and became worried all over again. "It is _not_ just a scratch. Would you please just let the nurse put some bandages on it?"

This was a good thought, but Galya was unable to even get into the tightly-knit circle, and she posted outside with an amused smirk tugging at one of her cheeks. The injuries clearly weren't as bad as they looked, and so she let the other teens fuss over the girl.

Ruby's dress was probably in the worst state of affairs, which was a shame for its inaugural run- not to mention given how much it had cost. Seeing the garment's uselessness, and tired of the equally pointless protests flying back and forth, Weiss bent down to the hem of her own gown.

*RIIIIP!*

Things suddenly returned to the pre-party quiet as this sound tore through their group. Everyone looked at Weiss who glared back unashamedly.

"What? It's not like I'll be likely to use this thing again." Whether this was a comment on her spendthrift habits or on their busy schedule, no one took Weiss up on it as she manhandled her partner to a workable position. "-Now don't move. Geeze, I thought it was guys that were supposed to act all tough and stupid."

"Hey…"

Objections were meek this time, easily overridden by Weiss's impatience. She did not even have to physically remove Ruby's other hand which had been clamped over the injury, simply letting it fall off on its own. Wincing at the sight, Ruby herself knew that it had been worse just a few minutes ago. Now it was merely sliced meat compared to the unidentifiable hash it had been before. Soon, even that was covered by the pristine white silk.

While Weiss held back her gag, Ruby let go of the breath she had been holding. The knot was tied good and tight on top, sealing away what she didn't want the others to see. She would have let the arm fall exhausted to the side had it not continued to be held preciously by her partner.

"There." Exasperated, but happy nonetheless, Weiss smiled wearily at her captain.

"Thanks." Sheepishly, sleepily, Ruby's free hand made its way to the back of her head in a gesture that felt right. "Not going to ask me to never do something like this again?"

"I know better."

"As much as I like the company, I do hope that the next time doesn't see any of you in my office." Reminding team RWBY of their mortality as well as the fact that she was still awaiting them patiently, Galya adopted her best impression of Glynda. The anagram betrayed none of her previous amusement. "That being said, I **will** be seeing you before this night is out. Right?"

Hiding behind the conveniently situated Weiss, Ruby gulped and mumbled an acceptance she hoped was sufficient to please the suddenly overbearing woman. Nodding, Galya turned on her heel before they could see her smirk.

"Since when are you afraid of nurses?" Joining the conversation, Blake asked, though she had a feeling she already knew the answer.

"Not nurses. Hospitals." Being subject to one too many ruminations on the subject had left a reflexive shiver in her spine and a lingering image in the back of her head. "Actually, them too."

"Hate to break it to ya, Sis." Cautiously, Yang gave Ruby a check on the shoulder. "You ain't getting out of this one like you snuck out of the party. If you were getting bored, you should've just come to find me. I wouldn't mind having you for a dancing partner again- or alternatively, I wouldn't have minded a good post-party smackdown."

"Guys, I think Ruby's evening has been tough enough as is." Being the only one without blood on her person or on her mind, Blake interceded for the girl who had lost quite a bit of it. Adding as a parting note: "-Besides, she probably had fun, in her own way."

Not the worst of nights, by far not the best. There was yet truth in Blake's words and Ruby was grateful for them, grateful even for that subtle wink which conspired harmlessly.

Furthermore, she should have been grateful that things had once again turned out for the better. Having exchanged her pound of flesh for the capture of Roman and Neo, and survived the worst of the social anxiety, she should now be able to rest easy. However, beyond the constant reminder of tomorrow's trials, there was something she felt had been forgotten.

Perhaps, something she wanted to forget.

* * *

' _I remember,_

' _Or, rather I should say that I understand. Because memories change and fade with time, but the truth stays the same._

' _The truth is that I chose to believe in an ideal and not a person. Is it such a wonder that I had a hard time holding on to such an illusory thing?_

' _You were never meant to be perfect, but that was what we expected of you. That is what you came to expect of yourself as you tried to find your place among us. But this is not fair, nor is it right. Your true strength was inspiring the best in all of us, and therefore it is us who have failed you._

' _I hope that you can forgive us. And more than that, I hope that these words reach you because I am unable to say them to your face. Would I have years ago- but no. I couldn't, wouldn't have. We are different people then we were then._

' _Yet, after everything is said and done, I still love you. Perhaps now more than ever before because I understand who you were, more than what you stood for. I understand why you chose her, and I am glad._

' _When we next meet, let us both be more of who we really are._

' _Farewell, Naruto.'_

No one would have noticed that internal light as it faded up and away, sublimated within the rays of moonshine streaming down to meet it. No one would have been left to mourn the passage of another soul to the next plane of existence if it hadn't happened in her outstretched palm, life flickering out underneath her metallic gaze.

It still existed eternally within her grasp, sharp faces like her own reflecting the same hollowness. It was no less beautiful without its secrets, no more interesting in death. The moment of realization alone was the pinnacle of its saga and now…

"Another one bites the Dust, huh?" Remorselessly, she crushed the crystal like it was naught but sugar. Then she scattered what was left, salting the earth and ensuring only death would follow.

"Ah well," The fate of Remnant would not have weighed heavily on her shoulders as she shrugged them, cold winds of change never impeding her stride as they licked her silvery locks. Galya cut through it all with a purposeful stride and a smile that was incised with a scalpel.

"I still have two new toys to play with."

* * *

Something felt amiss.

She couldn't yet tell if it was of the urgent variety, or simply the constant restlessness that should belong in the background like murmurs of the expectant crowd. Was this a normal discontent for someone still moving forward, or was it like the wrong size of shoe where every step was either knocking at her mind or pressing her further into something she didn't want to be?

Or maybe, she was simply bored.

' _Can't help you there. All my life I tried to tell myself that being bored was a good thing, that it meant nothing had gone wrong yet.'_ Her thoughts exactly, but what came next was what had her at the edge of her seat and kept her toe bouncing incessantly. _'It never worked, mainly because I had too much energy. But later during the war, because it usually meant that something had already gone wrong and I was just too stupid to realize it.'_

Ruby wasn't stupid. It was impossible not to realize the truth when it was spelled out for her in black and white like it had been in Galya's office early this morning. She had known without having to see the x-rays, but they solidified the matter in her mind, just as her bones had been doing in her body. Breaking and recrystallizing, spreading without urgency up from her forearm and down from her shin. This foreign invasion extended to everything else, contaminated her thoughts on the here and now.

' _I often wondered later on how Shikamaru could just pause in the moments between duties to watch the clouds. Simply lie down right then and there and unconcern himself with all the helter-skelter going on around him. Finally I asked, and he told me: "How can I not?"'_

She understood, but it was still hard to disengage from all the multitudinous matters which buffeted her back and forth from one urgency to another. With all this, it should be impossible for her to be bored, and yet there wasn't anything she could do now but be so. It was either that, or worry about the conspiracies plaguing her mind which yet had no cure.

' _Ruby, you promised me, and now I will do the same for you. I will fix this. We will figure it out.'_

" _I know."_ Confidence as hard as the minerals resting underneath that bandage, pervading ache in both. _'But I'm still booooored.'_

Maybe they should have entered the tournament anyway. It was practically torture just sitting there in the stands waiting for the first match to begin, waiting for a familiar face to appear so they could cheer them on. Ruby turned to another familiar face that was pursed in visible discontent.

"What's up, Weiss?" Her nose was down in her scroll as it had been for the past few hours with an intensity that made the other spectators give them ample distance. It was impossible that she was playing a game because her hands weren't moving, only her eyes which scanned back and forth reading the same lines over and over. "Weiss?"

"Hm?" Words finally stoppered the brain-drain. Blinking away the green of the screen and the white of the noise, Weiss glanced at her captain. "Oh, nothing."

"Nothing." Ruby stated skeptically.

"It's a letter," Expanding without further prompting, Weiss did not so much as roll her eyes. "From Winter, my sister."

"Oh. That's a good thing though, right?"

"She was supposed to be here for the tournament but got stuck on another duty somewhere up north." The more came out, the more her mind returned to the disturbing matter. "I'm not even sure where, because most of her letter has been blacked out by the military censors. A lot of what hasn't seems to be corrupted data that I can't make sense of."

"What does that mean?" Worrying about someone else's problems seemed to be so much easier than concerning herself over her own.

"I don't know."

' _Why send a letter? Because she is in a place where they cannot get a signal, far enough from both Atlas and Vale. Somewhere sensitive, hence the military censors. Makes sense, given Lt. Schnee is in special forces. Interference is more disturbing. Why? Because there is no clear motive nor mechanism. Where are the signals getting interrupted, here or there? Problem inherent with infrastructure, or is it intentional? Either option concerning.'_

"Thank you for spelling it out." There was a definite sarcasm with this gratitude, but Shino buzzed pensively as if he didn't hear it and was still focused on addressing the problem. "The only things I can really make out is about it being cold, there being good coffee, and…"

"And?"

Trust had been growing between the whole team, not just through the invisible roots tying them to earthly worries, but between branches reaching out into dreams of peace and understanding. There was a moment where Weiss wondered if she should share her tender kernel of knowledge- but only a moment.

"… and that she misses me."

Worry that was written in context was played out by Weiss's face as she divulged this intimacy. All her life weaknesses had been exposed and targeted, and with the people after them the present should be no different. Though now, the only one listening was Ruby, and she felt strangely secure in this fact.

"We're back."

"And! We brought popcorn!"

Taking their seats and usurping much of the bleak mood, Blake and Yang replaced it with the hypnotic scent of the freshly procured snack. Each of them handed the seated a bag, not missing the shift in expressions this gift bestowed.

"What'd we miss?"

"The first match hasn't even started yet, Yang." Weiss admonished, casually swallowing the last of the previous conversation along with a few carefully selected morsels.

"Oh." Chewing on her own handful, Yang mulled over the blank scoreboards and pristine arena. Grumbling with the corner of her mouth that wasn't occupied, "I knew that."

"Sorry," Times were changing rapidly, and Weiss offered this after only briefly considering her words. "I guess I'm still a little short."

"No, that would be Ruby." Yang fired back, careful to swallow this time.

"Hey! You can't say that, I'm still younger than you."

"You sure? Maybe you're secretly just really old and withered. I mean, you always seem to get lost reminiscing about something or another." Avoiding her sister's rebellion, Yang managed to put her into a lock with the one hand that wasn't balancing her snack. "See! You're still weak like an old woman!"

"Guys, let's not get kicked out before they even start," saying this with a small smile on her face. Before, Blake might not have said anything or simply pretended not to be associated with the sisters. Another part of this microcosm that was changing inside and out.

"Yeah, alright." Releasing her sister from the familiar Punch and Judy, the elder retuned her priorities to food, only for hand to reach down into a bag that was suspiciously empty. "Hey, wait a minute…"

"You know, since the matches haven't started yet, perhaps we should go see JNPR and wish them luck." Weiss reasoned, hoping that the excuse would be read as a chance to get up and stretch her legs instead of a need for distraction. "I hear CFVY is participating as well, it would be good to cheer on the teams representing Beacon."

"Someone's eager. I'm trying to decide who you're more eager to see: Jaune or Pyrrha." Ignoring her shortchanged popcorn, Yang satisfied herself with a little jab in retaliation for earlier. "But yeah, either way wouldn't be a bad idea. You up for a little walk, Ruby, Blake?"

"Someone should watch our seats. I'll stay here."

No one objected to Blake's reasoning, and Ruby was silently grateful as she was still masticating the last of her stolen gains. She nodded emphatically with full cheeks and hoped that would suffice.

"Alright, no time to waste, let's go."

' _Hey Ruby,'_ Standing up along with the other two, she swallowed first as she mentally prepared herself for a troubling question, last night's events weighing a lot heavier than the current snack. _'What's popcorn taste like?'_

Indeed difficult to answer, not unlike describing color to a blind man. In the time it would take them to wade through the crowds, she doubted she'd have an answer but endeavored to try anyway.

Pinching a kernel delicately in her fingers as if it were a snowflake, she considered its almost negligible weight, its predictable yet unique structure, its fragility as well as its annoying resilience when the bits of shell got stuck in between teeth. All these things being qualities which had no bearing on its nature.

" _It tastes like… carefree."_ Not exactly, there would always be something that words could not convey, something that was in the domain of experience. Following through on the action, she popped it in her mouth. _"With a helping of butter."_

' _Hmm. I guess I'll just have to try it for myself.'_

" _Yup."_

* * *

"Something the matter, Jaune?"

Something was always changing. At first, he had welcomed it, then he had resented it, and now he had finally come to accept it as an inarguable fact of life that he was just trying to keep up with. Was something wrong at this point, or did he just not understand it yet?

"I'm not sure…"

"You hardly said a word to RWBY when they came to wish us luck."

It was true, and he felt somewhat bad about it like he felt bad about ignoring his partner now. But time had taught Jaune some measure of priorities, and there was something niggling at the forefront of his mind telling him not to take his eyes off their Mystralian opponents who had all of theirs conspicuously hidden.

"Pyrrha, does that other team look weird to you?"

"Um, Jaune, I'm not sure that's a very nice thing to say." Actually, Pyrrha was sure that it wasn't, but was still struggling to find the right way to put words to the oddity.

"They are certainly more at ease than we seem to be." Weighing in on the pregame huddle, Ren tried to quantify it with logic. "Being older, they are likely more experienced than we are. Look, there is a distinct way they behave that gives it away."

Jaune had been. He noted that where one went, the others followed without having to be told. Even just waiting in the wings for their match, the four sets of eyes covered every corner and left no space for ambush. Each moved with the minimal amount of effort, yet hung around like a hungry animal waiting for a scrap.

This organic teamwork reminded Jaune of something, of memories both pleasant and disturbing and some which he was fairly certain weren't even his. If this were a comic book like the kind he used to read, he would struggle to label it an adventure or horror story, waffling between ninja and zombies.

"Meh, they don't look so tough." Tunneling in under her taller teammates, Nora interjected with this sentiment. "We can take 'em! JNPR's ready for anything!"

"No," Jaune shook his head, eyes never leaving their opposites. "We're not."

"What's this I hear? Cowardice in the face of the enemy?!" Equal parts surprised and expectant of the voice, relieved and dismayed, Jaune knew he would be safe in turning his back as others approached.

"Hello, Ms. Adel." Balking at Pyrrha's formal address, the prima donna of CFVY (And quite possible all of Beacon) feigned a blow to the heart and collapsed in the arms of her teammates. "Hello, Velvet, Yatsuhashi, Fox."

"Really, Pyrrha? Just me?" Recovering with the alacrity of the trends, Coco shifted her admonishment to Jaune and glared at him from behind her tinted lenses. "And _you_ , what's with the attitude? Jitters as a newbie are excusable- for everyone _but_ the captain."

"Ms. Adel-" "-Coco!" "…Coco, I'm sure Jaune didn't mean anything by it."

"Pyrrha's right. I just meant that we shouldn't get complacent." Never dropping his guard even in the face of his classmates, Jaune was a changed man. It no longer mattered if the past months had been a figment of his imagination, because it was now a part of him as much as anything else. "We'll never be prepared for everything, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try."

So often they didn't get a choice, it was in fact refreshing being in control for once, however fleeting that turned out to be.

Glancing over her shades, the other team captain threatened to banish that mastery with but a tawny look. Eyes which could memorize every detail of style with but a wink threatened to dissect him from the ground up with that same gesture. She didn't though, and released him with a satisfied smirk.

"So, _this_ is the person that rescued our little Rabbit."

Jaune was not quite sure what she meant but this, given that they had met several times in the past since the lunchroom incident. But he chalked it up to his misunderstanding of the female species, his sisters not preparing him for this brand of woman with foreign thoughts and tongue.

"…Huh?"

"Never mind." Coco let him off with a chuckle and a pat on the shoulder which, to his credit, he didn't flinch at. "Now, let's take a look at what's got your panties in a knot. Hmm…" With the same scrutiny that she had given Jaune, the senior student eyed the foreign team who replied with only a cursory glance. "Well, I can see what you mean. Their fashion sense is _horrible_."

"Coco!" So mortified was the rabbit Fauns at this blunt conclusion that Pyrrha felt the need to apologize for her.

"That isn't very considerate." Gently, the giant of the team voiced his opinion. "Besides, is it not a tad hypocritical?"

"How so?" Outspoken in every degree, Coco turned on her own team which meant Jaune had to devote a corner of his eye to their opponents.

"They're wearing sunglasses," Not needing to look to confirm this, the white-eyed boy of CFVY chimed in. "Just like you, Coco."

"Not like me, they're not." She sniffed. " _Mine_ are Ray Brown's. Besides," Turning back to the opposite side, she swept her hands over the strangers who didn't take offence so much as take notice of the conversation about them. "Their _entire_ team is wearing them, and their outfits don't even match!"

"I really don't think that illustrates anything about their combat prowess." Coming from the levelheaded on JNPR, this sentiment could find support in both camps. "…Although, one must question why they find it necessary to wear them indoors."

"Maybe they come from a place that's bright?" Feeling ignored for too long, Nora once again wormed her way in front of the conversation with this gem of logic.

"Personally, I don't remember Mistral being that sunny." KNotting her lips in an attempt not to frown, Pyrrha might have been kenning onto what her leader was seeing at last.

"That's right, you probably went to junior academy together seeing that they're from Haven, right?" Treading lightly with his deduction, Ren could see the pensiveness on the normally stalwart redhead.

"I'm trying to remember, sorry." Absently she apologized for her brain that would not produce anything, "There were so many tournaments and so much training that I didn't have a lot time to get to know classmates. However, I don't recall anyone who wore sunglasses like that."

"Huh, the mystery deepens." Coco offered aloofly, clapping both Jaune and Pyrrha on the shoulder and somehow making them feel small. "Well, best of luck anyway. Don't make us look bad out there!"

While the others shook hands and waved goodbye, Jaune nodded only once. When he turned back, their adversaries were already making their way to the field. But their leader hung on the rear of their formation like an alpha wolf and turned to him.

When she stared back, Jaune was sure that no one else was looking. Not only because he felt like the only one in the world at that moment, but because no one would believe him if he told them what he saw. In the same manner as Coco, she stared at him over the rim of her cheap plastic shades. And in the same way, she made him feel small and insignificant.

That was the end of the comparison. These were not the two earthly orbs bearing down on him like before, now Jaune found himself lost in the inescapable traction of a black hole. Sclera the color of midnight caught him in their gravity and promised to crush him. Then they winked, and strode away.

"Ready Jaune?"

No one was ever ready. The world changed too quickly for people to adjust to. Everyone died, and the lucky were reborn into someone who could cope with the way things had become. Dying, living, death, life, out, in, out in, breathe. Jaune breathed in, remembering that he was still alive, still moving forward, out into the light and the cheer of the stadium which was little more than an animated backdrop to his life.

"Let's do this."

* * *

The room was dead, cardboard walls muted sound and uninspiring beige paint killed all creative thought. A cold wind blew outside and through the cracks as if the enclosure weren't even there. Worst of all, the thermos on the counter sat empty, just like the paper in front of her. Among this dreariness sat Winter, pen clamped in her hands as she wondered if she too were not already dead and gone.

The orders which kept her there were the same she had received at the beginning of this torturous assignment. There was no other contact with the outside world, and she hadn't received a message on her scroll in months. It was impossible to know even if her letter got through, and so she sat there debating on the usefulness of writing another.

What would she say? What _could_ she say that wouldn't get eaten up by the censor's black marks?

Setting the pen down, she let her head rest in the hand it once occupied and closed her eyes to the bleak present and nonexistent future. Stuck in this backwater place with other nameless rank-and-file soldiers, it felt like the end of her career. The end of the world, as far as she was concerned, and the omnipresent fog which cut them off from any mainland did little to decry this image.

She missed. Many things, but her sister most desperately as the only one she could admit this to. Everyone else was relegated to subtle hints and implications. –Speaking of, she might try seeking out Bruno again, but she had even fewer words for him than she did her letter.

Maybe someone else's words would inspire her? With ample time to herself, she wandered over to the stack of books leant to her by the man himself and began to rifle through them, looking for something that wouldn't put her to sleep.

Her eyes shot open, more awake than a spoonful of the sugary slime at the bottom of the thermos. The bright yellow cover resting in her hands hurt to look at, but it was impossible to look away because she knew exactly what she held in her hands. How it had made its way into the loaner stack she had no reasonable clue, but she knew that she would have to return it to the man as soon as possible.

…after she read it, of course.

Any thoughts of it being a red herring or even a malicious deception were pushed to the back of her mind as Winter sat back down in her uninspiring seat which felt suddenly transformed. The whole prefab miraculously became as vibrant as that cover which she carefully peeled back to reveal the hand-written table of contents.

"-Lt. Schnee!"

Fighting the urge to tear that volume in half at this interruption, Winter turned towards where one of her assigned soldiers had barged in unannounced.

"Yes?"

Such an icy tone that even if the man hadn't worked with or known of Winter Schnee before, he could patently say he did now and also that he never wanted to again.

"-I'm terribly sorry Lt., b-but the digging crew found something and w-well…"

"Well? What am I supposed to do about it? Go tell Basayev. Isn't he supposed to be the historian here?" Winter was beyond irritated that she had to spell these things out to her subordinates.

"T-that's just it ma'am." Hardly holding himself together, Winter didn't think this man could slip any further in her estimation until he continued. "Dr.-Mr. Basayev he-"

* * *

"~I must drag my body through the muck and mire

Gather branches for its funeral pyre

Twigs I would rather twist into nests

Or whittle wooden wings and fly…~"

Setting down that charcoal stick, he briefly admired the drawing, or what little he could see in the piddling yellow light. Echoes of his whispers trailed off into the darkened reaches of the chamber, reminding him how he was the only living soul this far underground. –Well, that might not have been entirely true…

Squinting, he held the image side by side and compared it to the hulking object whose branching lines disappeared into the cracks. Gruesome details faded into shadows which lay beyond the reach of the electric lamps strung up from pitons hastily hammered into the rocky walls.

"Meh, close enough." No one was likely to see it, anyway.

Yet he set both image and instrument down carefully, replacing them with the machine-pistol which in contrast had slung carelessly at his side. Over his knitted cap he doffed a headset that had been wired to the surface, not yet turning it on and momentarily relishing the hollow sound of the ocean. White-noise for this black task which lay ahead.

All of his actions were done unhurriedly, and not just because until that point he had been sitting on several crates of high-yield explosives. The atmosphere was simply conducive to timelessness; a sense of immortality existed within that ancient construct entombed here with him. Its stooped form held up the weight of the world above them, as he fathomed it had for millennia before his arrival. Such power contained within stone that few could ever fathom, an eternity in waiting. Doubtlessly impressive, and yet…

"You're one ugly fucker, aren't you?" He smirked irreverently, laughed at the ludicrously of it all, including himself. What sort of poor decisions had led to this, he wondered? "Oh well, can't exactly help who we are, huh? And what's done is done- except for that which is still left to do."

While this statue might wait another eternity for someone to come along, the ones on the surface would not.

"Best get to work, ne?"

Smoothly he set about his task, with speed and not haste. Once again, he began singing gently to himself, to the nine-eyed monstrosity which glared out at him from beyond rock and time.

"~We file down our fangs on the bones of our foes

And curse their names with blood swollen tongues,~"

Wasted words trapped somewhere beneath the surface. With any luck, they would both stay that way, and no one would hear of the Gedō Mazō or Bruno Basayev ever again.

"~We file down our hearts on the kindness of friends

Pick them up and cut them down again…~"

* * *

 **Lyrics- Muck and Mire by Brown Bird (I know I used them before, but they are transplanted here)**


	16. Cenozoic: Oligocene

**I'm late. I have all the time in the world, and it is wasted.**

* * *

Jaune was finally starting to understand.

Things were finally starting to come together for him, slowly but surely. Perhaps he was forcing some of the pieces to fit, at least he was no longer whittling away at himself to do so. That was progress.

Progress was finding out that life was precious, not just his own, but that of his teammates, his friends. Where would he be without them? Certainly not in Amity Coliseum under the hungry gaze of thousands filling the stands, _hundreds_ of thousands watching his efforts worldwide on the live broadcast from the floating arena. This was no longer his childish dream but the wonderful, terrifying reality.

That razor-sharp distinction was also thanks to suffering, thanks to that nemesis which had incised himself in his mind. Jaune would not be here without him, either, nor his dark whispers of a parallel reality. That truth still existed behind the sunshine and rainbows.

And that truth was: there were just some battles that you couldn't win.

"What's it going to take to bring these guys down?"

Empathizing with Nora, Jaune noted the distinct shift from exuberance to exasperation in her voice, the brief pause in which she gulped a breath and hauled her hammer back over her shoulder. The weapon was at last showing its weight, the normal energizer of their team was running out of juice.

Unfortunately, he wasn't sure he had good news for her.

She was tired. They were all tired, or even beyond that. What had started as a series of well-played counters had quickly devolved into a battle of attrition in which team ABRN held the distinct advantage. Somehow, they were outlasting even the everlasting Nora, and running roughshod over his every plot with their relentless teamwork. JNPR's own cohesion had improved markedly, but it was nowhere near the clockwork maneuvers demonstrated by the team from Mistral. It was unnatural.

"I mean, look at that!" Jaune did, and followed her flagrant arm-waving to the scoreboard. One didn't need it to tell who was winning, but the dichotomy of yellow and green painted a very grim picture. "They have _got_ to be cheating!"

They were better, simple as that. It might have been hard for the hopeful hellion to accept, but Jaune had the advantage of knowing that there were a great many people better than himself, and that there was _always_ going to be someone better out there.

-Well, except for Pyrrha. She was the undisputed strongest, unparalleled in their generation and he suspected a few others. No one was better than her.

"Oof!"

Irony smashed into his musing as ABRN's captain Arslan Altan sent the redhead flying back to their position with the help of her teammate Bolin Hori. Taking it like the champ she was, Pyrrha shrugged off what would have been a staggering blow, but she was unable to stand before the two returned to finish the job.

Roused to action, Jaune lunged forward to intercept the thrown dagger and let it bounce off his shield. At last, the weight of it was working for Jaune instead of against him, he leveraged every ounce of Pyrrha's instruction to bash Bolin aside. The other man might have been able to block with his bo-staff but was unable to keep his footing under the momentous blow. Himself was finished when a vengeful Nora seized her opportunity, bashing him into one of the numerous icy stalagmites that had spawned at the beginning of the match. Taking the que, along with a couple of reclined shots from Pyrrha, Arslan backed off.

"Thanks." Pyrrha thanked him as she accepted the hand up.

Jaune himself nodded, even if he himself did not accept this. The thing was, she shouldn't have needed his help, shouldn't have required assistance and shouldn't have been kicked around like- well, _him_. Something was wrong, and it was more than the scoreboards.

"-What?! Oh, come on! That should have taken out at _least_ half his Aura!" Returning to the scoreboard, Nora screamed out her indignation.

It should have. Jaune had first-hand experience against her blows to judge with. Yet the public meter glowed enviously green still.

Should have. Shouldn't have. Everything that had been coming together was threatening to come undone. Even with Pyrrha, he knew they weren't the best team. But Jaune knew that even he should have been able to beat one of their opponents. Even with their teamwork, ABRN wasn't the strongest.

Even still, they were losing.

"We've all scored a hit on them, right?" It was a stupid question, whispered more to himself than to his team that was regrouping behind him. Nonetheless he had no doubt they heard him, just as he felt their tight nods at his back. "Ren?"

His entrance to their formation might have been more graceful than Pyrrha's, but Ren soon dropped from his on-point landing to a three-point stance on a knee. Grace could not outlast stamina. But Ren was giving it his all in this match, to a fight which should not have mattered but somehow **did**.

"A few… clips… here… and there." And to his credit, Ren answered and tried to stand, though not simultaneously. "Although… I did cut the pink-haired one. I saw it."

This was stated with an emphasis that had nothing to do with his labored breathing. Despite the obvious uninjured Nadir Shako, there was a cut on his jacket. Ren saw it and Jaune did too.

"I call total hax!" They all saw Bolin pick himself up from the shattering blow, no worse for the wear. Just like Nadir from Ren's slice, just like the entirety of that sunglasses-wearing team had time and again. "It's like they've got god-mode on or something!"

"Or something…" Not infallible. These were not gods, not devils, not even comparable to his own 'baby demon'. This was a problem looking to be solved. "We have to get a ring-out. It doesn't matter how invulnerable they are, if we're playing by tournament rules, we just have to get them over that line."

It might have been a technicality. His former tormentor might have called it cowardice, but he had also told Jaune to take every advantage he could. There was no such thing as honor in a fight, and now there was no more voice to bequeath guilt. Only him.

"Urchin."

Barely a whisper, drowned out by the crowds that were eating up this spectacle. Leering hoards enjoying the sight, not only of Mistral's champion, but watching her fail. This was all entertainment, blood-sport only missing the crimson hue.

But while they were loudly fidgeting in their seats, JNPR was wordlessly on the move. Two shields locked together and covered a shuffling retreat while grenades were lobbed over their heads. Small-caliber fire from Ren deterred anyone from sneaking around the side, at least until they got behind the hillock that they were inching towards.

Not that ABRN did, standing in their own loose formation as if they had all the time in the world. Jaune felt that they might have, the only limit they were on was dictated by their own bodies, their own wills to continue. For some reason, he found that he couldn't simply give up.

Finally deigning to flank them, team ABRN raced across the living landscape. When they circled the ice-mount, however, they were confronted only with a vast tundra that led up to the ring's edge. Shaded eyes searched the bleak scenery for team JNPR which had all but disappeared into the dynamic scenery.

"Stingray!"

Somehow going unnoticed until that moment, Ren and his colorful partner sprang forth from underneath the peak above ABRN. Emerging from an unaccustomed halcyon, Nora took that bottled-up energy and released it against the frangible slope with all her might. Fragments exploded outwards and glaciers tumbled down upon ABRN who showed none of their nonplus, but who also failed to react in time to mitigate this sneak-attack.

Their only choice was to escape the oncoming avalanche, a move which neatly bifurcated their team with Arslan and Nadir backpedaling to avoid getting crushed. On the other side of the rout, Reese Chloris snapped her teammate onto her hoverboard to whisk them both out of harm's way.

Exactly as planned.

No longer was the match under ABRN's tight control. Not even Reese's hoverboard seemed to follow her dictation as it suddenly jerked from underfoot. Its electronics went haywire and fizzled in confusion. Yet the board kept moving, pulled by some unseen magnetics and flinging both combatants towards the rapidly approaching boundaries of the battle. Not illustrating any surprise to this development, Reese wordlessly hurled her teammate back towards the main stage to ensure that at least one of them was spared a technical knockout.

Instead, a dropkick slammed into Bolin before he could touch base as Pyrrha extracted her revenge from earlier. He followed his teammate over the line and the edge of the arena as the crowd erupted in cheers and jeers.

Then it became quiet. No crowd, no clash of blades, not even the rasp of his own breath.

 _Squid._

On the other side, Jaune sat in wait under the cover of a snowy mist which had been provided by Nora's overzealousness. Coldness bled through his 'scrawny ass' and up into his spine, quelling his boiling blood. Stillness rooted him to the spot, but he actively searched for movement at the edge of his senses, and he waited.

" _Eight points: Larynx, spine, lungs, liver, jugular, subclavian artery, kidneys, heart."_ He recounted to himself in the silence, not confident enough to say it out loud. Unable to master this technique, unable to even master himself, Jaune still remembered the crux of this lesson: _"You have one shot, make it count."_

It was impossible to hear anything past the beating of his own heart, impossible to sense anything past his own fear clouding things more than the colloid sea around him. Too thick to smell, to hear, to even breathe unlabored, the icy mist hid everything including himself in its nothingness. So, he followed the gap in the nothingness, the cavity left in his targets' wake as they slowly made their way towards him.

" _There!"_

Reacting to a sharp noise, Nadir jerked his assault rifle and fired a burst into the cloud, hitting nothing but dispersing the mist enough to see an empty scabbard clatter on the ice.

The attack hit him from the other side, metal slab colliding with all the force of a snowplow to separate him from his captain. It didn't stop and instead kept surging towards the edge of the arena. His sneakers slide on the slick turf without traction while Jaune's own bare, numb feet stuck reliably to the ground. With one final heave, the captain of JNPR battered the living hockey puck across the ice and out of the ring, then turning to confront his counterpart.

The moment he did this, he himself was nearly thrown off his feet and to the same fate as the pink-haired member of ABRN. When Arslan's punch hit his shield, it felt like a hammer smashing tinfoil and Jaune crumpled. Although, this saved him from being skidded across the ice and he dropped from his knees into a roll.

Stopping himself with _Crocea Mors,_ Jaune tried to stand only to have his leg jerked from underneath him courtesy of Arslan's tethered dagger. Quickly severing the silken wrapping, he once again scuttled out of the way as the huntswoman descended with a shattering punch which served to kick up yet more frozen dust and glassy splinters of ice. Along with Jaune who, amazingly enough, landed on his feet.

From there, he tried to regain his breath and then his balance. He shouldn't be surprised, no plan survived first contact, and it would be perseverance from beginning to end that would win this bout. And so, Jaune sallied himself just in time for Arslan to come darting out of the mist, her yellow robe flashing like a lightning bolt and her dagger howling like the wind.

Objectively, Jaune had gotten better. And he countered each of her blows with growing confidence, if not fading strength. Without the handicap of a team, without background distraction, without even the benefit of being able to clearly see his adversary, this was a true test of how far he had come.

It was supposed to be, anyway. Supposed to be a fight against his fellow student, but Arslan attacked him with a single-minded relentlessness that belonged more to the Grimm than human. Her strength was on par with Yang's, and her dexterousness was comparable to Blake's. But there was no craftiness, no spark of intelligence behind the opaque lenses. And with each blow, Jaune found his fear of failure whittled away, replaced by resentment.

This feeling was ignored easily enough, sidestepped as Jaune himself did out of the way of her lunge. Unapologetically he tripped her, and the dark-skin woman fell, blending into the dark mist. Out of sight and hopefully out of the ring.

But not out of mind, Jaune waited until he heard the blaring horn announcing his victory before turning his back on the whole thing.

Before he could try to find satisfaction in this ignominious victory though, white wrappings materialized and tangled themselves around his neck. Instinctually he jabbed his sword into the icy terrane like an icepick, but the ribbons tore him backwards, yanking on his neck and jerking him away from his weapon.

In the midst of the assault he had also released his shield so that both hands worked at the restraints around his neck. Managing to tear the relatively weak binds, he was not relieved of asphyxiation as a fist plowed into his stomach and knocked the wind out of him at the same time it knocked him back.

"-aht…a-e… yo- doing?!" Jaune wheezed as his hands flailed, clutching his throat, his stomach, and searching for his weapons simultaneously. Finding his breath at the same time he found _Crocea Mors,_ he retreated behind the staked sword and used it to haul himself to his feet.

"The match is over!" This had to be true, because the last blow took all his remaining Aura. "Why are you still fighting?"

Looking little different from when they had started, Arslan paused in her stride and regarded him. Where her mouth remained an unwritten line, Jaune thought that he could see conflict twisting in her eyes behind the double layered blackness.

"I… am sorry." Only the pause hinted that she meant this, a break from the graven countenance for her real personality to claw its way out. "But that is what is commanded of me."

"What-?"

No time to question this strange remark, her intent was conveyed with the dagger that flew at him, and Jaune only had enough opportunity to wrench his sword free to deflect the opening attack. As predictable as a bullet's trajectory, Arslan was in front of him once again and beneath his guard. Jaune dropped his hilt to deflect the woman's fist, his own counter met with her reclaimed dagger as they once again entered a close-quarter duel.

This was the razor's edge, he was finally there. Every strike was the severance between life and death, and he knew that the result would determine whether or not his story continued.

-Or, he would have known, if he were not fighting with his all. There was no time to initiate thought, only reacting to the mechanical assault with an equally primitive routine. Muscles tensed and slacked at the speed of electricity, but movement following half again after this. It was too slow- he was too slow and was going to be punished for it.

It came about so fast.

And then it was finished, ending the only way it possibly could. Metal pierced flesh, silence becoming the only victor. The crowd had settled long ago along with the dust, not so much as mumbling amongst themselves while they each tried to comprehend what they were witnessing far below.

Wishing he could be so ignorant, Jaune stood there equally stunned but with the horrifying clarity of what had transpired. There was a disconnect between his mind and his body, but those were still his hands grasping the blade- _his_ blade which was buried hilt-deep between Arslan's third and fourth rib.

"Oh, shit," Feebly Jaune swore, unsure of what else to do, "I-I'm sorry…"

There really wasn't anything else he could say, and it wouldn't have mattered anyway as the public loudly expressed their own opinions. Chaos overcame the stadium, except for the automated cameras which remained perturbingly steady. They zoomed in on his shocked face and broadcast it to every corner of every Kingdom.

But Jaune didn't care for the spectators and their turmoil, as down on the arena floor things continued to be oddly serene.

And then they became just plain odd.

Under the widening eyes of everyone in the floating arena, including his flabbergasted teammates, Arslan kicked him away. With one swift, unhindered move, she grabbed the sharpened metal and yanked it out. She cast it aside as if it hadn't cut her hands- as if it hadn't previously been jutting from her sternum.

Then she turned her gaze back to Jaune. Somewhere during their frenzied scuffle, the glasses had come off and Jaune found himself reintroduced with the deathly stare he desperately wanted to believe he imagined.

But, like the voice which had once plagued him, this sight would not go away when he closed his eyes. Even if there was no blood, this was no dream. That knowledge was hammered home with each deliberate step the woman- the huntress- the _thing_ took towards him. With each step his heart beat faster and faster until it was one relentless tattoo against his chest, his blood pounding until it was steady stream tearing through his mind.

Now, in that instant, Jaune truly understood.

There were some battles you just couldn't win.

* * *

"W-wait, Lieutenant-"

"-Stow it!" One great stride put the protests in the past, carried her over the transept and into the balmy morning. She felt none of the mild spring frost which boiled off her infuriated cheeks, and the perpetual fog itself seemed to part ahead of a raging Winter. "The next words out of your mouth better be damned useful or I swear-!"

Picking himself up off the stoop, the private dodged the threat tossed over her shoulder and scrambled to catch up to the main assault.

"Um- t-the garrison is already mobilized and we have two companies on the scene-"

"Casualties?! Hostages?! What's his position?! What kind of weapons does he have?!"

Her words scarcely had time to get ahead of her arrival as she stomped into the dig site. They were enough of a warning to clear a path for her, workers with blackened cheeks and impeccably dressed soldiers alike both leapt aside with more fear of this woman than the supposed emergency.

"Ma'am." One apparently competent soldier held out a headset for her to take, directing her ire to the communication line that ran deep underground.

Winter snatched it from him unquestioningly and donned it, bent the microphone to her lips which were flush with anger and chagrin. She kept her hand there for a breath. A long, deep, steady breath which she used to calm herself in anticipation of the stilted conversation about to take place. The air which entered her lungs was crisp, just like the connection which picked up the life on the other end.

" _Hello, Lieutenant."_

"Basayev," Trying to make his name not sound like a curse word, she glared at the tunnel entrance as if she could stare clear through the rocks. "What the hell do you think you are doing?"

For a while there was only the continued rasp of respiration, slow and steady which indicated no exertion, no rush; just the careful deliberation of words like arming or disarming a bomb.

" _Being foolish, I suppose."_ Himself trying not to sound flippant, he quickly tacked on an addendum, _"-And making things difficult for you. I am sorry about that."_

 **-Flip-**

Silenced by hundreds of meters of stone, his pliers halted after clipping a wire as if in remorse for their own occupation.

"I really am," The air he drew in was stale, musty and cool. But he did not sniffle, did not flinch away from his task. "Sorry, that is. I meant what I said, even though you have no reason to believe me. I'm still not your enemy."

" _If that's true,"_ Her words came in through his own earphones, the only sound in that solitary cavern. Even then, they somehow seemed to reverberate in his head. _"Then why don't we just talk about this? Release the hostages and give yourself up. We can end this without violence."_

His chuckle was harsh and rasping, even to his own ears. He had grown accustomed to the solitude, even before he set foot in that underground chamber.

" _There aren't any hostages."_

 **-Flip-**

This declaration leapt across the connection and up to the surface, shocking Winter and making her take in her surroundings for the first time. Covering the microphone, she glanced around at the motley group still milling about the worksite. Orange-clad crew and armed Atlesian soldiers sat or leaned on equipment, apparently waiting on her to finish the negotiation without hurry. She sought out the private who had retrieved her first, pinning him with a glare.

"Are all the workers accounted for? How many have gone in or out before I arrived?" Not shouting to avoid giving away information to the listener, there was no less command in her voice and the poor lad nearly fainted under the sudden attention.

"My boys've all made it to the surface." Taking pity and control of the situation, the SDC foreman stepped up from a group that looked to be playing cards. "'S far as I know, the crazy bastard's the only one down there. Why, I couldn't fathom. Brought 'im down there like we's supposed to and showed 'im what we'd found. Then, he pulls a gun and tells us to scram and don't come back. We're hopin' you could talk some sense in'a him."

Sweat began trickling down the swarthy man's moustache as he held himself upright under her gaze, an eternity under pressure. It might have felt like she was carving through his soul, but she was more concerned with drilling down to the core of the problem.

" _Satisfied?"_ Crackling mirth from the speakers saved the man and returned her ire to the conjured image of the man with his thick glasses and rounded smile.

 **-Flip-**

" _Not even close."_

"Didn't think so." With a grunt of exertion, Bruno pried open the next crate and began carefully unloading its contents.

" _I'll ask again,"_ He guessed that she heard the noise, or perhaps she was starting to piece things together. _"What the_ _ **hell**_ _are you doing down there Basayev? You're not your father, you're smart. You're not just some mountain-man who has no recourse but violence. Other people might not know that, but I do. However, I can't protect you, I can't help you if you don't tell me_ _ **why**_ _."_

"Hm." From her end, it might have been a hum of consideration. It was, but Bruno was more focused on the delicate task of affixing the armed plastic explosive to the hackly surface. "You're right."

" _What?"_

"You're right, about a great many things, Lt. Schnee." Working his way methodically around the circular chamber, he was all too happy to waste words with the woman. "I'm not my father. You can't protect me from the demonizing of your people or your government and I don't want you to. But most of all…" Sticking another charge to the surface, he glanced over his shoulder at the statue which continued to menace him throughout this ordeal- ever since he received the fateful message which brought him here.

 **-Flip-**

"… _We can, and we will, end this."_

"Just what are you planning to do?" Having been pacing back and forth over the muddy ground, Winter stopped, facing the mountainside and let her heels sink into the mud as her gaze sunk into the stone. "It's my job to protect this project. I can't let you harm anyone."

" _Correction: it's your job to protect the people working on this project."_ She could tell he was distracted when he said this. Some of his lines felt rehearsed and they contrasted starkly with the moments of contemplation. _"Besides, keep everyone out of the tunnel, and no one will get hurt."_

"Well," He whispered to himself, pulling out his hand-sketched map of the island's geology and correlating it with the bleak cavern wall. "Almost no one…Ah, there's the fault." He approached the discolored rock, planting more charges all up its face to exploit the preexisting fracture.

" _You know that I could use force."_ Regret bled through the line, staining the threat. _"I_ _ **will**_ _use force if you don't concede and come up disarmed. I have a full garrison up here that I can bring to bear if I must."_

"I have the one entrance in or out of this cave covered." The subgun dangled listlessly from a single-point sling around his neck, ready for him to defend himself, if need be. "And eyesight besides, I'm not a bad shot."

" _I'm a full-fledged huntress, a trained professional. By all accounts, you haven't even unlocked your Aura. I can take a few shots, if that's what's needed. I doubt you could say the same."_

"You probably right about that. But don't forget, I've had training too."

" _As a reservist!"_

"-As an Explosive Ordinance tech."

 **-Flip-**

Things should have clicked into place then- actually, they should have been illuminated long ago, but Winter was still stuck on the cusp of comprehension as she froze and stared into the darkness of the rough-hewn tunnel. Days of stagnation had rusted the gears in her mind, and she was trying desperately to break free when-

"Lieutenant Schnee."

Tearing off the headset, she turned around to look at the one who had given it to her.

"What?!" She barked in his face, but the man didn't so much as flinch. Clearly, this was a professional soldier, and Winter was reminded once again that they were not _her_ soldiers. These were strangers, and the one person she thought she knew was fulfilling all her worst assumptions.

"I just wish to inform you that the SDC representative is on his way from the mainland and will be here in approximately two hours."

"So?"

Turning away from the apparent non-issue, Winter began to fidget and toy with the idea of delving into the depths herself to haul the man out by his scruff. Meanwhile, the noncom watched unperturbedly, as stony as the mountain behind them.

"The SDC demands results. We are already behind schedule as it is thanks to this… interruption."

"Make your point," She growled, her impatience making itself known.

"To be frank, ma'am, giving you the opportunity to negotiate was a courtesy. If you cannot convince Mr. Basayev by the time the representative arrives, then I am afraid we will have to send a squad down to flush him out."

"I won't authorize that."

"You won't need to. Mr. Schnee will."

The heat bled out of her as quickly as if she had been stabbed, and an icy cold took up residence in her hands and face. Her mouth tried to form words of defiance while her fingers clutched at the illusion of her authority.

"Just what the hell do you mean by that, Sergeant?" Her own sense of order was keeping her from strangling him, but even that was quickly slipping from her fingers. " _ **I**_ am the ranking soldier on this island, _**not**_ Jacques Schnee."

" _ **As**_ an officer, you should understand just how important this operation is to the future of your country." As an officer, she was expected to serve and protect. Winter had only ever prayed that it wasn't in that order. She wasn't anywhere near naïve, just hopeful perhaps, enough that this trope came as a slap in the face. "The success of the SDC is the success of Atlas. We need this- the world needs our Dust. Compared to that, whatever political protection Basayev has is all but worthless."

This was true. Bruno was just a man without anything behind or in front of him. And what was she, besides a woman with a sword and sense of purpose?

 _Why the hell are you doing this, Basayev?_

"No, it is _**you**_ who doesn't seem to understand, Sergeant." Cold had replaced her usual coolness. Like water, Winter expanded and hardened the more the temperature dropped and the hired toady dried up under her glare. "We are literally blind in this situation. That man down there has the tactical advantage, not to mention Remnant-knows _**how**_ much explosive material _and_ the knowhow to use it! You send those men down there, you're sending them to their deaths, and I _**cannot**_ allow that."

"With all due respect, it is their _job_ to put their lives on the line, Lt. Schnee. Compared to the strategic value of-"

"Don't you **dare** finish that sentence." Though shorter than the man by half a head, Winter seemed to tower over him in that instance and he all but lost what credibility he might have had. Seeing that she wasn't going to get any more complaints nor anything useful out of the Sergeant, she turned to the foreman who balked at being once again wrangled into this mess. " **You** , check the logs to make sure all demolition material is accounted for. Get your workers off their asses and setting up a cordon around the dig-site. I don't want anyone within shouting distance of this SNAFU."

"R-right." The foreman's retreat started off a chain reaction as the workers suddenly found themselves with jobs once again, swimming around the dumbstruck SDC hired guns.

Winter turned back to the crate upon which she left the headset and reapplied it, sinking back into the conversation.

" _I'm about to have company, I take it?"_

Instead of answering the rhetorical, Winter asked her own question which was far more relevant at that juncture.

"Why?"

Across the divide, she could practically hear the thoughts being shuffled like the pages of the notebook she had absently jammed into her pocket. Winter knew Basayev understood her as much as she did his cramped scrawl, and waited for the picture to be filled in. Things were finally starting to make sense, but she was still missing that crucial perspective.

" _It's a long story, and I think that I'm running out of time."_

 **-Flip-**

Dusting off his old skillset as he went along meant that he could work quicker. However, he was three-quarters of the way around the room and time was already running out. There was only so fast one could do this sort of thing.

" _You are. So give me the short version."_

Grinning despite the grimness, he should have expected Winter would not give up so easily. He had been counting on it, hoping for it as much as he hoped he wasn't making a grievous mistake.

"There's more than Dust down here." He glared at the statue which was made of nothing but the stuff, yet unlike any he'd ever seen. Unlike, he was sure, anyone had seen in thousands of years. Crystal so opaque it could swallow light, perhaps swallow one's soul if they were able to see into but one of its nine carved eyes.

" _The artifact."_

"A weapon." There was no surprise to be heard, and Bruno expected that she must have already surmised as much. "One so powerful that no one should be allowed to get their hands on it."

" _If I understand what you are planning to do, it will make it so that no one will be able to get to the Dust, either. That could cause the destabilization of whole economies- hell, whole Kingdoms might would be at risk without that fuel. Is it really worth it?"_

This had been the very question he had asked since day one, the one tasked of him when Ozpin and Ooblek handed him the assignment. There were plenty of others who could carry out this job, plenty of other ways to bring about the same outcome. But he had been selected, not because he could make bombs or friends, but because he could make that choice.

"Yes."

Unequivocally, unhesitating as he jammed in the last fuse. Not so liberating a feeling, nothing left to do now that he was done. His purpose played out, Bruno plodded his way back to the pile of empty crates and sat down. Waited.

"… _You know that I still have an obligation to stop you."_

Now that would be a nice feeling, to have a duty, to be needed.

"I'd expect you'd try." Choking on this expectation, he hated the fact that he had to be the one to say it. "Just remember, there are some fights we can't win."

* * *

Humming to herself again, quiet enough that the vibrations were drowned out by the drone of the crowd. But the rhythm of her song conducted the pace of the world; fingers playing an imaginary instrument plucked at the heartstrings of living, breathing people far below her.

This time, a few bars bled from her lips as she swayed with the breeze passing through that lofty arena in the clouds.

"~There is an answer in a question

And there is hope within despair

And there is beauty within failure

And there are depths beyond compare…~"

She was beautiful as always, and so was the song. But hollow was her voice and empty were the words. It was with a galvanized gaze that she looked upon the uproar her actions had caused. Cries of dismay sloughed off her stainless soul, her iridescent hair danced in the sun and shimmered in extasy.

"~There is a role of a lifetime

And there's a song yet to be sung

And there's a dumpster in the driveway

Of all the plans that came undone…"

This was the beginning and end of so many mortal plans. From the chaos and cacophony would come opportunity for something new, as it always did.

From the barren concrete hallway behind her came a shadow, creeping inevitably.

"~How could something so fair, be so cruel…"

Something else entered her voice, filling it with a semblance of life and a question. She turned to confront the intruder who had slunk in not-unbeknownst with a nefarious twinkle in her eye.

"~When this black sun revolved around you?"

The crowd churned and roiled in primordial fear as they regarded the face of the undead. Soon the Grimm would arrive, attracted by this cacophony to feast upon the people's so-called morals. And then they would rid the survivors, the remnants, of what so-called dignity they had left. They were predictable that way, both man and monster.

As was what came next.

"It's over, Ms. Schwarzkopf." Ruby unveiled herself from the darkness, that unadorned statement filling up the hallway and blocking the way back.

"Of course it is, My Dear." Neither patronizing nor malicious, Galya's smile was sublime and no different than it had been the day before. Nothing had changed apart from her now unbraided hair and casual sun-dress replacing hospital scrubs. "This era of peace has run its course, and like all good things must end. Do you know how many times this script has been rehashed in different words? In different languages? Did that stale-soul around your neck ever tell you how many others came before you? How many dreamers were in your shoes-?"

"I don't care about that."

Galya's sharp features resisted the frown of consternation.

"You should. It would make you think twice before believing everything They say. You're too trusting My Dear. Not everyone with a kind word is there to help you. And just because someone is immortal doesn't mean they are all-knowing. Did you ever stop to consider that they are trapped for a reason? They made a mistake- or perhaps the true mistake was keeping them around at all. They should have disappeared, but instead we are stuck with the burden of Their sin. In many ways, society would have been better off without Dust. Imagine all the war which could have been avoided. We could worry about how to survive against Grimm, instead of having to survive ourselves.

"Is this not madness? A parody of life? Humans and Faunus apparently cannot exist together. Hell- Humans cannot live with other Humans on this Remnant of a world. There is an undeniable inequality, one that keeps us at each other's throats. And it is precipitated by Them. You are privileged, My Dear, whether you realize it or not. People like you are allowed to dream."

"…Are you done?"

If her cheeks could sag, they would have in severe disappointment.

"Is that really all you have to say? No witticisms? No refutation? I would have expected at least a plea for the benevolence of a few souls, your friends, maybe even your so-called 'partner'. Such a simple girl, not so much as a cliché for tradition."

"…You _do_ talk a lot."

It wasn't that much of an insult, but it still allowed Galya to smirk in partial victory. For while it was more truth than anything else, she could see the true **rage** festering behind that childish front.

"I am me, always have been. I will not apologize for that."

"So," Her trembling might have been mistaken for fear, but neither feared what both knew was inevitable. "It was _**you**_ who killed team ABRN? Turned them into those- those-?!" Ruby wouldn't have been able to quell herself on her own, but she managed to press on without regret. "How many people have you already turned into mindless zombies? Did you intend the same for me- for us, or something worse? How can you _live_ with yourself?!"

"I live because I don't have a choice. It is what humans do best." Factually, but without malice, "Does that answer disappoint you? As living beings, it is our sole edict: Survive, by any means necessary. Necessity realizes a great many things, beautiful and ugly."

A fleer and a wink, tossing her head back revealed something buried in those silvery tresses. In comparison to her lustrous hair, the gunmetal-gray Dust crystal mounted in an earring stood apart as dull and unpleasant. The silvered fingers which held it in place at first seemed extravagant for what could barely be called a pebble. Squinting, Ruby finally realized that it was the Dust itself which had its claws in the woman.

"Would you call me a symbiote or a parasite? Keep in mind that whatever label you apply to me applies to yourself."

"I'm not like you."

"No, you're not. Unlike me, you _chose_ this path."

"What do you mean by that?" It was a curiosity she knew was a mistake, but being righteous also meant having to know the wrong.

"You went looking for a fairytale life," Hands like metal clamps hugged her shoulders so roughly that for a minute Ruby thought she was about to peel away her own skin. "Whereas all I ever wanted was to be a real girl."

"What… are you?"

There was an answer she knew without even asking, and perhaps she didn't really want to. She was already aware that the story's monster didn't have to be a dragon. Mankind was often far more beastly, and the things Naruto revealed about his era opened a new page- a new book full of frightening possibilities.

"Am I alive? Perhaps, more so than my predecessor, at any rate. Slightly less disposable, too." The wry grin stretched across her face, pulled cheeks taught against bone like tanned leather. "All the same, I was created to be someone else's idea of perfection. I'm still someone else's dream, their ambition, their living will." Prying her chin up with a wedge of levity she said, "Like it? I'm told I have my father's hands. -Oh, and my mother's eyes!"

The woman's titter felt cold as it bounced around the concrete hallway and wormed its way around her spine. Yet it still added oxygen for that spark which burned wildly in Ruby's gut, threatening to consume her if left unchecked.

"That…" Invisible arms wrapped themselves around her and smothered the fire within. She shook her head, burying it within that phantasmal embrace. "You're still a person. You had a choice."

"You're upset." If this fact amused Galya, her frown was a strange way of showing contempt. "Is it because you trusted me? -Yet you also trusted one of Them. They led you here. It is because of their selfishness that you've become involved in this farce. You're right, we have a choice, and yet you choose to repeat the errors of the past, _Their_ mistakes. My decisions lead to bloodshed, but is that really any worse than your own? How many hopeful fools will die for this cause? Right now, you can still choose to do something different, to diverge from that script. You can forget about all this, drop the crystal and walk away. I will give you that choice."

"You already know that's not going to happen." Out of all the millions of possibilities, both knew that wasn't how the story went. That wasn't how it ended. "Even if I had the choice, you're not the one who could give it to me."

"No," Nodding her head half in morn, half in approval, Galya gave one last regretful smile that once again seemed genuine. "Neither of us have the right of it, do we?"

She lunged at the student with twin blades of jaundiced Aura materializing in her palms. Ruby apparently had no time to react, as she stood there still swaddled in her cloak and a consoling feeling.

Then Galya stopped cold.

"Well," smile straining harder than usual against an unseen force, "this is new."

"Actually," From the open veranda behind her came a new voice, a new silhouette fell into the hallway. "It's still something old."

Shadow linking her to Galya, Blake attempted a smile that fought its way through all the disturbing things she had heard. Not to mention a stubborn resistance trying to twist it into something that it was not. "Is this where you normally say: 'Shadow Imitation Technique, success'?"

' _Yeah, I do. Get your own catch-phrase.'_

"But you should already know, Nara," Unperturbed by the darkness binding her, Galya followed Blake's saunter as if it were her own, smiled with the same satisfaction of a cat with her prey. "There's still nothing new under the sun. Isn't that how the phrase goes?"

"Not another word out of you." Raising a finger to her throat, Galya was forced to mimic Blake's movements and caressed the electric-yellow scalpel against her own jugular.

"Blake," Herself reaching out from inner turmoil, Ruby stopped her friend from doing something regrettable. "Don't."

"Oh no, please do." Blake's frown no longer had bearing on the woman's smile which continued to be serene. "If I am to die, being proven wrong would bring me no greater joy."

"You might want to cover your ears, Sis," Trekking out from behind her sister, Yang folded her arms to ward off the disturbed shiver. "-But there's no two ways about it, she is _fucked up_."

There were no denials, but neither did Ruby wish to say anything lest the unpalatable truth come out. Her anger was her own, her fault that she didn't know how to deal with it. She couldn't blame the woman for that continuous burn, any more than she could blame a dragon for breathing fire.

"She does have a point." Lips twisted with the better taste of logic that no one dared speak. Weiss joined her comrades and the conversation as she entered from next to Blake. "If we don't… _kill her_ , what should we do?"

"Whatever we decide," No time for silence, Blake swallowed her distaste, "we better do it quickly."

It wasn't like they did not hear the mounting turmoil down below, only that they were forced to ignore it. Ozpin had trusted them to this task, just as they had to trust that Ozpin and the others were taking care of it. Hope become a mandate in the face of the alternative, because no one wanted to contemplate just how fragile their position was.

"The Schnee and- _Aburame_ is it? – I must admire their logic. Fear is the proper response, so long as you don't let it keep you from doing what is necessary." As much as she could turn her head, Galya looked back to Ruby. "You, on the other hand, from where do you derive your anger? Don't pretend like you gave a shit about those four. You didn't even know team ABRN- you hardly know your 'comrades' fighting them. So far, I have done nothing to you that wouldn't have happened anyway."

With each twitch Galya took towards a smile, Blake felt her control breaking like the snapping of strings. No longer could Shikamaru keep the strain and concern out of his voice as he muttered his frustrations.

"Admit that you're angry with yourself, My Dear," possessiveness in her voice reached out and ripped out a few more binds. "Because you know I'm right."

"You're right." The only ones surprised by this didn't know her, didn't truly understand what she lived with. Guilt was always interwoven with hope and both were like shackles for her, always threatening to tear her apart. Because she _did_ exist in the real world, as well as in her dreams. One foot in the past, one in the future. "-But I can deal with it. Weiss!" Wresting the present back under her control, Ruby barked the command at her partner at the same time she withdrew _Crescent Rose_. "Put her on ice!"

"Look out!"

Not even Yang commented on the tacky wordplay, as she was far more concerned with following the advice blaring at her from all sides. Grabbing her sister, she threw them both on the ground just as the darkened hallway was illuminated by an inferno. Firelight burned through the last tendrils of shadows as both Blake and Weiss sought cover behind either side of the exit.

Even sheltered from a direct blast, radiant heat alone was enough to burn flesh. The flames themselves consumed all the oxygen in that confined space; so that even when Ruby and Yang emerged from shelter unscathed, they were gasping and choking for air.

"The H-*hack*-ell was that?!" Yang was just as much surprised by their hairy rescue as she was by the attack. On the ground, she struggled to catch her breath and shrug off the protective shroud made from her luxurious locks. In a span of milliseconds, her pride and joy had had more than redoubled in mass and volume then solidified into a spiked mass. A toss of her head withered most of the quill-like strands back to a manageable level but left her with more than a little itch- to kill the person responsible. "Someone's gonna pay… who the heck're you?"

"Me?" Standing at the very back, not one word was needed from those lush lips to declare that she was the one who attacked them. Though it was hard to fathom why, as they had never seen this woman before-as surely, they would remember such a picture of perfection. Whereas Galya was as beautiful as a blade, this woman was irrefutably a bombshell dropped on them. She was rightly irritated that they could not identify her by her hourglass figure, her heart-shaped face nor her eyes which conveyed a sense of danger like a snake. "Why, I'm… you know what? It doesn't matter."

Contrasting in every way with her ally, she turned to Galya and snipped at her. "Quit playing around. We still need you alive… for now." Soon the chaotic system would be able to sustain itself. And when that happened, Cinder would be only too glad to rid herself of the one who stole her limelight.

"As you are oft found of reminding me." Escaping the flames, Galya had not escaped the soot which she dusted off with a sneer towards her opposite. "So, I'll remind you that I have no use for you people either. Better be nice to me, or else I'll let you deal with this shit on your own."

"Like we'd let you go!" Brushing off the bluster, Blake and Weiss resumed their original positions but with defense prepared this time.

"Irritating, aren't they?" Copying Galya's sneer with more voluptuousness, Cinder made to demonstrate just how futile their threats were. Effortlessly she summoned more flames around her gloved hands. "I'm almost glad now that you had to deal with them."

"I find it endearing." Nonchalant despite being in the middle of the coming conflagration, Galya swept the four students with a look that was equal parts commiserate and leering. "It deserves to be preserved… but then it wouldn't be special, would it?"

"I'd say you're the one about to become an endangered species." Momentarily curbing her anger so she could direct it behind her guarded fists, few people would try to talk Yang down. "In case you haven't noticed, it's two-to-one odds you got going."

"So it is." Galya commented airily even as Cinder gathered up air for a chortle. "Plus, I'm fairly useless in a fight... at least, that's what I'm told. Therefore…"

The forewarning worked almost as well for them as it did Cinder, but she was also one of the farthest away when the ceiling buckled and exploded. Gambling on the woman's self-preservation instincts, Ruby grabbed Yang and followed Galya through the newly created skylight. Barely missing falling debris in her sudden starburst, she wasn't thinking about dodging. She wasn't thinking at all, really, otherwise she would have realized what sort of pain she was in. She would have noticed the sickening feeling, totally separate from the normal symptoms, as the fragments of concrete passed right _through_ her in her flight.

Emerging onto the roof didn't mean she could breathe easy. One step taken forward nearly brought her low while bile crept higher through her esophagus. But the next came anyway as she saw Galya already making a dash through the forest of metal poles holding up the stadium's massive lights.

There would have been a third too, one that would have sent a volcano of blood raging through her skull. For better or worse, Yang regained wherewithal in time to tackle her sister before she lost her head to a sword rather than determination. The passing blade might have shaved off a few of her now spiked hairs, but for once Yang was far more concerned with the metal pilon it bisected instead.

Both she and her sister recovered remarkably well, Yang in a fighting stance and Ruby reliant on her supporting leg while lining up a shot with the fully-deployed _Crescent Rose_. But they both still had to take a moment to recover when they saw who attacked them.

"Holy shit."

This would have to suffice because Ruby was too tongue-tied to say anything for herself. Maybe she should have offered an apology, considering this confrontation was ultimately her fault. But even if she could find the words, would the ones it was meant for hear it? Did any part of her familiar adversaries exist behind the whitewashed expression plastered on their face?

"I think that you know each another!" Galya shouted back just like another fan at a football game. "Why don't you give them your best, for old-time's sake!"

"Ruby, follow her." Not taking her own attention off the possessed corpses in front of them, Yang dared to command her captain who was still looking at the two with something akin to pity. "You can catch up. I'll handle these two." And just to preempt any protests, she added, "If there's anything left of these two in there, I'll be sure to beat it out of them."

' _It'll be fine, Ruby.'_

Though it wasn't necessary to get her moving, it was nice for her to hear and the platitude helped prevent Ruby from looking back as she took off in pursuit of Galya. Even if it was a lie, it was one she could distract herself with.

' _Tch, Brat ought to know I wouldn't let anything happen to a student under my care.'_ Jiraiya huffed with indignation once Ruby and Naruto were out of earshot.

"Don't think I'm letting you off for my hair," Yang shot back as she returned the unblinking stares boring into her. "I know you had something to do with it."

' _And you should be grateful! That's one of the techniques which made me famous throughout the lands! The Hari-Jizō is only able to be done properly when you have hair as lush as mine.'_

"You should be grateful I have something to take my aggression out on."

Roman and Neo both stared back with those unblinking black eyes, seemingly content to let her talk her way into oblivion. Weren't they supposed to attack at some point?

' _Don't hold back, girl.'_

It seemed it was up to her. Yang exploded at them.

* * *

Every other step exploded with pain, every second she spent on the chase was another building up to critical mass. Blazing agony through her entire body made her feel that she was about to implode like a neutron star. It acted as a beacon to the first wave of Grimm which had broken through the city's barrier, even more than the dark thoughts which weighed her down as she ran.

They came in singles and droves, Gryphon, Nevermore, Rapier Wasps the size of cars all got themselves wedged in the jungle-gym of light fixtures as they tried to get a bite of her. The few that managed to get through she ruthlessly cut down without a second's pause. She couldn't afford it, not a moment could be spared when all her focus had to be on staying upright.

Galya was faster than she would have given herself credit for, nimble. She had the added advantage of knowing where the chase was headed, as well as a not-inconsequential head start. Any other day it would have been simple for Ruby to spirit herself ahead of the woman. But after using her semblance so soon before, she didn't dare risk it. Every time she did, Naruto's chakra would be eat away at her. It was breaking and rehealing bones with every move, replacing them with crystal. It was a slow death, but it could be as fast as herself, if she were to let it.

"Naruto," She started through clenched teeth, "Do you think we can hit her?"

' _Shouldn't I be asking you that?'_ There was humor in his voice even though there was none to be found elsewhere.

"I **know** I can." And she smiled, despite it all, because she still could. "I just want to make sure you're not getting soft on me."

' _Not in your dreams.'_

Wind continued to rush by her ears, chaotic gusts blew every which-way atop that flying platform and buffeted her as she ran. Another breeze was added on top of that, gentle at first but quickly growing to a gale-force which trailed at her heels along with her scythe.

' _Ready.'_

Not needing to be told twice, Ruby planted her boot on the ground and let the tread disintegrate into a black streak. Stiffness in her limb did a good job of arresting her momentum, energy which transferred into _Crescent Rose_ as she let it swing freely.

Silent and swift as the real reaper's blade, the one she cast made of wind flew on ahead of her and directly for Galya. No one else would have been able to see it nor hear it, flying faster than the speed of sound and more transparent than the darkening sky overhead.

Yet, it was avoided.

Twisting at an ungainly angle in air between a triad of supports, Galya let the blade pass beneath her with little more than a few of her silvery strands to claim as its victory. Her land was just as graceful as everything else even as the superstructures tumbled down to the roof around her. She stood up among the crashing lights, sparks like fireworks going up all around her and she was none the more ruffled for it.

"You're not going to give up." Nothing in this, not a question and no expectations. "It seems you're ready to kill me. Am I correct?"

"If I have to." The run had given her time to cool her anger, enough to know that this was a possibility. Also, enough to know that she might no longer be able to.

"You will. I promise." Earlier reluctance whisked away by that fierce wind, Galya adopted a practiced stance with a glowing scalpel held in the claw of her forefinger. "If you do… when you do, make me a promise."

The request might have caught Ruby flat-footed, but not off guard. Her weapon was still held firmly between the two, her gaze reflected in the equally steely surface.

"Promise me that you will destroy the Dust." Not waiting for the refusal, she forwarded the demand as she stepped towards Ruby. "-At least this Dust. Cast it into the deepest pits of Hell where it belongs. You must be able to understand this, at least."

"No," Ruby protested, shaking her head. "I don't understand. Why don't you just stop fighting, do it yourself?"

"It's obvious My Dear," Galya smiled sympathetically, which Ruby now guessed might be for herself. "I'm the villain in this situation, you're the hero. And this is the end. That's how things go."

"They don't have to." Frustration reared its head again. "You have a choice!"

Her yell became a roar, enough to crack open the earth and make the arena quaver in the sky. A wall of wind swept all the others aside as it rushed over the roof's lip, nearly knocked them both over as well. Before her emotions could erupt on that stage, one of Vale's background purple mountains beat her to it. By the time she looked over it had already been torn asunder, sprouting two plumes of black wings which eclipsed the sky like ash. The rest of the dragon followed soon after, alighting from its centuries-old perch to beat massive leathery wings towards them.

"See?! Ha, ha!" Somehow, Galya's giggle was audible over all that. Somehow, she was still finding something humorous in this darkest hour. "This is perfect! Is it not everything you ever dreamed of?!"

Somehow, it was. Even in this nightmare, even in this veritable hell, a part of Ruby clutched to the fantastical aspect. It gave her hope. For if there was a hell on Remnant, surely there could someday be a heaven as well.

"Come! Let us find you that 'happily ever after'!"

* * *

 **Lyrics are from Death Cab for Cutie: Black Sun**


	17. Cenozoic: Miocene

**Wow, first week back to school hit me like Yang after messing with her hair. I guess I'm a glutton for punishment.**

* * *

Things always get worse before they get better.

This was another truism, carved in the foundation of their being. Every aspect of life seemed to be built on the assumption that things would go wrong, and usually in the worst possible ways. Idioms constantly told them to endure these hardships for whatever came next, supposing that this was somehow worth all the effort.

But what if there was nothing at the end of the rainbow? The sun always rises, except for those who pass away in the dark, quietly. The storm always passes, except for those who are perpetually stuck in that squall, buffeted to and froe by the winds of change for all eternity.

It was always darkest before the dawn, but Jaune wondered if that dawn for them would ever come. An impenetrable nighttime had fallen just as soon as the sun had set. A tempest of Grimm had rolled in and blocked out the stars just as they had been switching on in the sky overhead. Not yet dinnertime for most of Vale's residents and yet it was the darkest hour the Kingdom had ever seen.

Black as the immortal eyes which bore into him no matter how many times they struck them down.

Jaune was wrong before when he thought he knew. Only now, when there was truly nothing left to give did he understand what that meant: One barters away dignity, borrows pieces of life that were not meant to be given. They rely on the crutch of comrades and lean on the strength of strangers who owe them nothing.

"Y'know what their problem is?" Asked with the assuredness of an answer, the dark-skinned student from Atlas raised his musical weapon to his lips. "They ain't got no _**soul**_."

With a single toot on his trumpet, Flynt Coal stopped the undeads' advances in their tracks and very nearly blew his comrades away.

"Now!" Jaune managed to command over the deafening noise, "Immobilize them!"

He had been right in a way, though. The battlefield was a time of truth. Titles were stripped off and layers were worn down to expose people's natures. Secrets held 'til death had their chance to come out when Grimm came 'a knocking.

There was no reason for Pyrrha to handicap herself any longer. No one would dare begrudge her control of polarity as it bound the possessed huntsman and huntresses in neat little bows of rebar while they were stull doubled over, stunned by the blast from the trumpet.

"Well, now those squares are taken care of." Flynt's teammate preened with forced cheer, clacking her skates on the chipped tile to coax a Pavlovian smile.

Together, they had managed to do what team JNPR couldn't do alone. It seemed that every competitor had stepped up to the plate in this time of crisis, former enemies found common ground that was shaking under their feet. From CRDL to CFVY, to those who hadn't even been afforded an introduction. Not one camera was left to record their heroics. And, chances were, there wouldn't be anyone left to remember them either. Yet they stayed, buckled down and fought back when they had every right to flee within the first signs of danger. It was beautiful, in a way.

"Yeah, but we still have work to do." Ren interjected soberly, somberly as he turned back to the torrent of Grimm spilling into the stadium, a tarry deluge raining down on them.

Many of the civilians had been evacuated already, but there was only so fast one could clear out a structure of this magnitude. It was inevitable that there were stragglers in the frenzied rush to escape. Undisciplined and unaccustomed to such exigency, they pushed and shoved, trampled over one another in their desperation. Their unavoidable panic proved enticing to the flood of monsters which gobbled them up like fresh calamari.

It would be a lie to say that the students _weren't_ afraid as well. The beasts had never been far from the mind, robbing the sky of its moon and horizon, and silencing the background screams one by one.

They had been forced to ignore these sounds while they dealt with the threat to their own lives which took priority. Although, no matter how much they told themselves this, it would never be enough to rid them of the guilt. They could never do enough, and that was a lesson that Jaune had learned a long time ago.

"Ren's right, this is no time to celebrate." Scarcely time enough to take a cursory glance at the situation devolving around them and come up with a plan of action. "Ren, Nora, get an account for other teams still here. Try to gather them and coordinate a sweep, I want to get as many civilians out as we can. Pyrrha, see if you can't get CFVY over there to help you out. They'll listen to you, and others will listen to second-years more than they will us."

Without pause to see if his team would follow the command, Jaune turned to the duo that had rushed to their aid when things started getting bottom heavy, hoping they would repeat the feat.

"Do you think you two could find General Ironwood? I'm pretty sure I saw him around here just a while ago. Let him know that there are still non-combatants that need to be evacuated. If anyone can get transport off this island, it's him."

Discharging his plan with a single breath, Jaune was turning blue by the time Neon Katt smiled and he felt relief fill his lungs.

"You betcha Blondie," Already rolling, Neon sent Jaune a wink with her tail as she turned to be on her way. "I'll have the General up to speed before you can blink."

"I should go find our other teammates," Flynt started off, in a direction opposite to his partner.

"No," Jaune yipped, halting both in their hasty egress. "No one should go anywhere alone. We don't want to lose anyone else."

The two Atlesian students regarded the transformation from request to order with more reluctance. They were no soldiers though, and quickly made the independent decision that the Beacon student was right.

"Try not to fall behind, will ya?" Neon jibed her partner as she rolled on ahead.

"Yeah, yeah. I'll keep the beat."

Even as the two skated and leapt over the debris field, his own team still waited at Jaune's back.

"What about you?"

Jaune looked at Ren and then his partner before turning back to face the restrained team ABRN.

"There's something I need to check."

They took his resolve at face value and departed without further delay. Somehow, they had found confidence in him where even Jaune wasn't pretending to know what he was doing. For all he knew, he might have been leading them to their deaths while he walked calmly towards his own. He didn't think about that, just like he didn't think about what to do anymore, and just did.

Strangely tranquil as he plodded nearer, in her bindings, it was if the shadow of Arslan had lost all its will to struggle and simply gone limp. This did not keep him from approaching with the tip of his sword leading him.

-Which turned out to be a good thing. Because as soon as he was near enough to poke at flesh through iron bindings, that flesh leapt out and tried to capture him. Going boneless within that coil, Arslan slithered out and snapped at Jaune all in the same instant.

The surprise attack did little as Jaune fell back into a sturdy defense the same time the undead woman erected herself. She flowed to her feet, joints nesting back together with an audible snap like crisp celery.

"That your Semblance?" Jaune inquired, trying not to show his perturbation. "Gotta say, it's- uh, unique."

Wordless, weaponless, she continued to glare at him silently. Although, perhaps it only looked like a glare because the inky sclera showed no light, none of the spark that he knew was there.

"You can hear me, can't you?" Jaune tested, scooting a step forward. "You spoke before. What did you mean by: 'that's what's commanded of you'? Who commanded you? What did they do to you?"

Honestly, Jaune was unsure what answer he expected to get. He didn't even know what he was fishing for other than a closure he was unlikely to obtain.

"…Finish it."

"W-what?" Expecting nothing, he was unprepared for this. It could very well have been a trick, yet deep down he knew that was what he had to do. "Um, in case you haven't noticed, that's pretty much what we've been trying to do this whole time and it isn't working. Maybe if you could give me a hint?"

Would he be able to do it even then? Could Jaune actually kill someone? That time… that time had been different. He hadn't meant to kill Cardin, he wasn't even sure if he meant to kill himself with that silly little blade. It had simply forced itself into his hands like words in his mouth, thoughts inside his head. This was different. This was his choice.

And seeming like she could see right through Jaune to the heart of the problem, Arslan smiled, cracking lips coated in paper-mâché.

"You think too much kid."

* * *

' _Come on Idiot, think!'_

"Kind of busy here-!"

Blake cut herself off, holding her words as well as her breath before the tongues of flame could finish French kissing her. Aura abated the heat down to distinct spiciness on her lips and an acid burn like raw peppers smashed across her skin. If not for that protection though, her pale skin would've been peeled away like an onion, her lungs a charbroiled travesty of a five-star meal. If not for her teammate taking at least half of the aggressive attention… she didn't want to think about that.

Neither did Shikamaru, but he really had no choice in the matter. It was his _job_ to think, his one saving grace in an otherwise passive existence. But his once-sharp mind had no doubt atrophied in its confinement, the mind games he played with himself were now playing tricks on him and he felt… useless.

It was the way Blake felt facing off against this avatar of fire. With a flick of her wrist, the woman banished the shadows, ravaged her clones and scattered the beginnings of every plan to retaliate so that there was little more she could do than dodge the succeeding salvos of liquid heat.

Weiss fared little better, as every barrier she erected to give them breathing room was melted like a popsicle in summer. And even the insects which dared come to their aid were incinerated before they got close.

And what was worse, she was still just toying with them.

"Come on, show me what you can really do." Flaunting her advantage as well as her womanly guile, Cinder mocked them from her stationary position. "I want to see which power is stronger, the old or the new."

There was a barb to be made at the woman's expense, but Blake didn't have Yang's penchant nor the patience for it. However, not for the first time, she wished the blonde bruiser was there with them.

And when, exactly, had that started? Somewhere along the line, the others had burrowed their way into her heart and mind. Their dependable presence shifted aside the obvious solution, the go-to that she had used countless times before.

' _There's no running away from this one,'_ Shikamaru muttered with the bitterness of the last cup of coffee, the drag on the cigarette which took it right up to the butt. _'She's obviously after us. And I'm not sure she'd let you go even if you were to give up. To that kind of woman… well, calling you insects might be an insult to Shino.'_

"Alright," Blake growled to herself, unable to refute the unflattering and uninspiring comparison while cowering behind an upended slab of concrete and the remains of cheap bench-seats. "Then I hope you have a plan, because we sure could use it."

Silence wasn't what Blake wanted to hear, but neither was the wet sizzling of her shelter being melted behind her back. What temperature to be able to liquify stone! She felt its radiance even as she swapped out for another clone that vaporized before the flames even broke through.

Shikamaru wasn't used to feeling helpless. It had happened but one other time. There was a post-facto guilt when he received news that his sensei had perished at the hands of Akatsuki, and afterwards he avowed never to feel that again. He became more proactive, improving himself as well as his strategies. There was always something he could be thinking about, something he could be doing. The situation was never so hopeless as to warrant his disinterest.

Ironically, it was Naruto who had taught him that. And when the optimistic blonde had disappeared into obscurity, it had been all too easy for Shikamaru to follow him, surround himself in a skin of ennui. Regressing to his preteen years, he could pretend that the world no longer concerned him insomuch that he missed the clouds lazily cruising past.

But the truth doesn't stay buried forever. Try as he might, he could no longer deny his emotional investment. He wanted to see these people succeed, to witness the Will of Fire be reborn from that unassuming spark.

So why couldn't he do anything?! Of all times to falter, why now?!

' _Okay, look,'_ Pretending to breathe deep was almost as good as actually doing it, and he could feel Blake start to mimic him. _'You're outclassed. Simple as that. It's not a particularly good matchup for fighting styles, she's more experienced and she seems to have some sort of augmentation that's not Dust related.'_

"Great." Blake growled, abandoning her post and flitting through the growing thicket of debris. "Now tell me something that's actually useful!"

' _I'm trying to help,'_ Trying to drown out all the interfering noise, reciting the facts over and over to himself like a prayer.

"You're not doing a very good job!" Blake snarled as her dress snagged on a torn piece of metal and a dark red gash ran past her Aura and up her thigh.

' _Don't you think I know that?!'_ The blood trickling down her leg suddenly felt cold despite the heat. Blake could feel every drop of sweat as acutely as a finger worming its way to her throat.

'… _Sorry,'_ Shikamaru sighed, in this action remembering a little bit more of who he used to be. _'Alright, I have an idea but…'_

He sounded unsure because he felt it. But his reticence wasn't doing anyone any good as each second spent in self-scrutiny was another where things could spiral further out of control. Though speaking of spirals, he wondered if his plan really the best option because it smelled too suggestively of Naruto's influence.

" _But what?"_ Breaking his doubt with her question, Blake reminded him that she was not discerning.

Peeking out over her cover as if watching the clock during one of Port's lectures, Blake saw Cinder floating languidly on an airstream of her own making. Like the instructor himself, she looked in no particular rush to finish the lesson.

' _I'm going to need you to trust me.'_

Out of all the things he could have asked though, this was probably the most difficult for Blake to do. Consistently Shikamaru had won her over with his rationale and articulated arguments. But trust, that was something reserved for a very select few whom Blake herself had trouble enumerating. And the fact that he had to ask for it at all sent her perception askew, thrust into doubt everything which came before.

But, what choice did she have?

"Dynamic Entry!"

The flurry of blows struck Cinder who was as much taken aback by the audacious attack as the others. Living up to the proclaimed dynamism, it didn't end when she crashed into the growing pile of rubble. A flowering green energy with a blade for a stamen marked her, propelling her further into the pit of her own making. The impact shattered both her obsidian bow and the concrete under her back, a great fissure running down the steps to their feet. And just for good measure, the blooming cloud of dust was riddled with multiple mag dumps from at least two sources- it was hard to tell in the chaotic free for all.

"Sun…" Dry eyes were blinked to make sure this was no illusion, and parched lips were wetted to make sure they didn't make a mistake. "…What the hell was that?!"

"'Dunno," Standing tall with his back to her, her fellow Faunus rubbed a finger on his lip over what might have been a grin as his tail wagered in contentment. "Somehow, it just felt like the right thing to do."

"And what are you still doing here?" Incredulity with more than his antics, Blake simply didn't understand his motives in hanging around a sinking ship.

Turning, Sun revealed the broad smile that was indeed there.

"It just felt like the right thing to do."

Blake shook her head with a different smile and a different brand of incredulity, one that was immensely grateful for the interruption.

' _It's not over yet.'_

Pulled back by the seriousness in the voice- just as she pulled both Sun and herself back to cover right before multitudes of flaming ballistae tore through the settling dust. The arrows passed just over their heads, lighting up the night. Very likely Shikamaru had saved her again, even if he couldn't do the same for everyone.

The sound was very distinctive against the homogeneity of the others. Scores of pings as hard objects collided were offset by the one meaty thwack amongst them like a slap in the face of the rescuers.

And, of course, one could not forget about the screams.

"Scarlet!" Sun clawed away at the very thing which rescued him from disaster, angry at both it and himself. "Let me go, Blake!"

Though she paused briefly upon the lasso in her hands, Blake did not need advice to tell her this was a bad idea. Sun's downed teammate was closer to Weiss, and already an unamused Cinder was consuming the distance which remained.

"The lot of you really are like insects," Cinder snarled, wiping off a drib of blood from her lips with a glove that looked to be in worse shape than she herself. "Always crawling out of the woodwork. You can't help yourselves when the bright lights start flying, even though you should stay far, far away." Igniting her own flame, it burned away the incident stains and promised to do the same for the huntsman at her feet. "The only difference I see is that when we're done, there might be one or two cockroaches left."

As if to disabuse her of this philosophy, the hand palming flame leapt up and slapped her.

"Oops." Forcing the action if not the satisfaction, Blake stood out in the open with a wire-thin shadow connecting them and her own hand cupping a pinked cheek. "Did we forget that we are mortal too?"

"You, girl," A flare of her powers dissolved the connection, left an angry red mark on Cinder's face which had nothing to do with her mood. "Are asking to suffer."

"Isn't that life, though?" No one heard her whisper, least of all Blake herself whose mind focused on the recitation of her task.

These lollygagging thoughts were banished like the darkness around them when Cinder conjured a globe of fire and hurled it at Blake. Her elongate shadow rose up into a wall whereupon the living incendiary smashed against it. It broke apart into individual flames like worms which burrowed their way into the massless barrier.

In the time it took them to chew their way through, Blake was already next to Cinder with an overhand strike poised above them both. But the other woman had seen this coming in the reflection of an obsidian blade which congealed moments earlier. Cinder lashed out blind with a preemptive slash that passed effortlessly through another shade.

Sensing a setup before she even saw the dark shape slithering up behind her, Cinder threw herself upwards out of its reach. Landing from her aerobatics, her sword now converted into a bow which loosed another salvo of flaming projectiles. Molecularly-sharp arrowheads sunk into the concrete, pinning the silken ribbon there and illuminating both it and the woman's widening surprise.

The bisected clone of Blake finally melted behind her, wrapping itself around her wrist and linking her back to the Faunus who hadn't apparently moved at all. Within Cinder's line of sight again, Blake raised up her empty right hand. Cinder was forced to mirror the gesture with her own grasp occupied by the doubly-dangerous bow. The sharpened tip was now poised over her waspish waist and Cinder watched as Blake unsympathetically completed the action, thrusting her closed fist towards her stomach.

Cinder felt herself grin as the weapon crumbled uselessly against her velvet dress, returning to the sand from which it was forged.

"Oops," She mocked, shrugging despite her binds. "Nice try, though."

She wasn't ignorant to the fact that the students had successfully extracted their wounded comrade from under her thumb. But the boy's mattered so little in comparison to the others, to even the juvenile girl standing there still with a look of wry victory.

"That face suits you." Cinder preened, demonstrating what real triumph looked like as she gave not a care to the stadium crumbling down around them nor the restraints holding her. "That's how all success is for you Faunus, isn't it? Tainted. In all honesty, do you ever see a time where you'll be able to stop fighting? Or how about a simple victory that doesn't come at such high a cost?"

"If you'd ever done anything in your life that meant something," Blake didn't have enough faith for victory, and was just trying to wheedle a little more time. "You wouldn't need to ask that question. It's all worth it."

"Look around you," Both an aphorism and a command, "What could be more important in life than the conclusion? Nothing you've done will matter in the morning. And the same goes for every other soul unlucky enough to bare witness."

"The same goes for you," She tried not to glance over at her sheltered companions, Weiss's once eye-catching dress quickly becoming stained by Scarlet. "Or have you sold your soul already?"

"If I have, it was a small price to pay." Shrugging her shoulders, Cinder shrugged the spectral binds as if they were just as inconsequential compared to her Semblance which flared brilliantly.

"Keep that in mind when it's all over." Defiant, even as she watched the shadows scatter like she desired to do herself.

"Dear girl, do you not pay attention?" Cinder saw the way she stood, taught as an arrow ready to fly, but without direction. "This is all there is. Just me and you now, it seems. Or do you think that there is something ahead which will judge me good or evil?"

"No," Blake deflated, shut herself off to the illumination. "But," Her amber eyes split open and shone with their own inner light which glared exultantly. "Something behind you might."

"Please," Not nearly as fond of clichés as her reluctant ally, Cinder had already grown tired with this unimaginative banter. "That is literally the oldest trick in the b-"

A drop of saliva as murky and dubious as her soul landed on her shoulder, sizzled like a hot griddle.

"Although," Blake contemplated, taking a slow step backwards. "He might just be wondering how tasty you are."

Body turning on a mounted swivel, Cinder was at first confronted only with a tarry pelt which threatened to smother her. It was greasy and matted like a bed of moss crawling up the side of a cliff with plenty of patches where chunks had eroded away. And it just kept going up, her neck craning to the beaked overhang which more resembled a tractor scoop which originally had been meant to demolish the obstruction but had instead been abandoned in the rain until gnarly holes were rusted out. Its eyes were too far up in the darkness to make out as anything but squirming little beasts of their own, like bats on the ceiling of a cave. The smell was something else, a combination of all similes and a departure from anything earthly altogether. It was a wonder she hadn't noticed it before.

It was a wonder she hadn't tried to distance herself from this horrifying thing, but the simple reality was that Cinder couldn't. Not that she was shocked to inaction, but that she repeatedly tried and failed to leap away from the mutated Gryphon. Her limbs wriggled along with the sunken gaze which followed her, but neither could get away from their attachment. Firing up her semblance did little more than unveil those dumb yet inquisitive eyes which made her skin crawl like thousands of ants.

"What's going on?!" The Gryphon seemed to ask the same thing as it watched its pre-cooked dinner with the same patience as a starving student watched the microwave go round and round.

' _Some might call it divine justice.'_ Cinder froze, felt that cold spot in the middle of her back where there might have been a zipper, but wasn't. _'But there isn't really anything divine about this, is there? Not even the power which you stole. It's all mortal, like your hubris.'_

Mind finally working at its usual speed, Shikamaru filled in the blanks.

' _When? Blake's clone, the one you thought you destroyed. How? You might be able to scatter my shadows, but only when they're surrounding you. There is plenty of shade inside your body, lungs, organs, that empty head of yours. Why? Well, because in case you haven't been paying attention, Grimm seem to like us sentient Dust as much as you do.'_

As her flames died out and the eldritch beast loomed closer Cinder began to hyperventilate. Or she tried, until that too was stifled, and she found herself suffocating.

' _Don't worry,'_ A deep rumbling washed over her, numbed by the sheer panic which rushed through her extremities with no place to go. _'You'll have plenty of time to appreciate the irony.'_

One last crackle of flame might have added a piquant kick to the snack- had the giant Gryphon not swallowed Cinder whole the way socialites down flaming shots. A burp which released visible puffs of ash would have proved just as satisfying for Blake if she were still watching the spectacle.

"How's he doing?" Skidding into their little dugout, Blake scanned the collection of faces, all of which were surprisingly paler than Weiss herself.

"He'll live." She grumbled disgruntledly, trying to stand up and rid herself of the caked blood on her hands. She gave up on both when it was clear she was just rubbing it in, and her ponytail bumped the ceiling. "It was already cauterized so the arrow wasn't easy to remove. And then I had to have some… help," Glancing over her shoulder, they watched as some of the stains on the rock started to crawl away on eight spindly legs, "Uh, stitching him back up."

"Unngh," On the operating slab Scarlet groaned, trying to find a middle-ground with his eyelids that wasn't wide open or clenched shut. "So… does this mean I'll get like, spider-powers or something?"

"Sorry bud," Keeping up his moral duty, Sun patted his teammate delicately on the shoulder. "That only works in comics."

"You're just lucky it didn't hit anything vital." Weiss huffed.

"I think I lost a kidney…."

"That's why you have two. Besides, I think some of the maggots which crawled in there are working on that."

"Ugh, I think I'm going to be sick!" Neptune stood up, highlighting how quickly he was turning from blue to green.

"No time for that." As if he were back in grade school, Blake's authoritative tone forced Neptune to sit back down and hold it.

"You didn't finish her off?" Weiss asked.

She began to crane her neck to look around the ragged edge of their cover, but halfway through wondered if she really dared. The screech which rattled their bones like tuning forks sealed that decision, and the following quake made them all consider running away without looking back at all.

"We might have a different problem now." Not limiting herself with the possibility, Blake was already shifting Sun's incapacitated teammate to a position where their fourth member could carry him.

"Can't we just run away from this one?" Weiss reasoned, "We still need to catch up to Ruby and Yang."

Another teeth-chattering scream interrupted their thoughts and actions.

"…It's not after us, per se." Blake admitted, sharing a look and a silence with Weiss that compensated for more explanation.

"Out of the frying pan and into the fire, huh?" Sun lamented as he stood up to join the expedition. "-Or is it the other way around?"

"Neither." Weiss declared with a sigh that foretold something which wasn't much better. "It's just the way things are around here."

Blake agreed.

"The story so far."

* * *

17.6 grains, an archaic measurement retrieved from time immemorial, now consumed in less than a blink. Fire, the eternal spark of creativity and destruction swelled past its confines, throwing the metal spheres astray like miniature meteors in a cosmic game of pool.

But in this game of life or death, this was not the first stone thrown. Nor would it be the last.

For what felt like the umpteenth time, Yang succeeded in blasting off Roman's arm only to see it reform in seconds. Truthfully, at this point she had given up watching the phenomenon which had become as interesting as licking postage stamps for wedding invitations. The limb's waxy scraps reattached themselves behind her back while she blocked the next slash from a zombie-Neo. Retaliating with another of her precious shotshells, Yang was less than surprised when the mindless construct shattered into glassy flakes.

What she hadn't gotten used to yet was the relentlessness of Roman's attacks which came even before the last of Neo's illusion had faded. Perhaps it only seemed different because there was no pause to gab, no villainous banter passed through the corpse's lips as if they were wired shut- not allowing a moment to breathe, either, as the blows kept raining down on her. Yang was hard pressed to think, to wonder how she had lasted this long against such tireless opponents.

' _Don't think, just jump.'_

She did, allowing the parasol blade to whiz harmlessly beneath her while splaying her legs forward and back. One checked Neo in the chin while the other shoved Roman backwards and tottering towards the edge- so close! But not quite enough as he launched a rocket and propelled himself back into the fight.

' _To the right.'_

Not getting frustrated, not stopping to question or thank the advisement, Yang simply did as instructed and let the inhuman projectile slam into Necro-Neo. She had to admit that she would have been a great deal more disadvantaged without the extra set of eyes. Even if they weren't the eyes she would have chosen on a normal day.

' _What? How am I not supposed to appreciate such graceful beauty?'_ Yang was surely no Tsunade, for both good and ill. A good deal more light-hearted, not to mention lighter in the chest area. But that might be corrected in time. Along with her punches which, while strong, where nowhere near earth-shattering.

"Aren't you supposed to be helping me, not comparing me to old flames?" Growling in irritation, more with her sticky situation than the lecherous commentary.

' _I can do both. Example: duck.'_

Letting the blow sail over her head, caressing her hair which would certainly need a good cleansing afterwards, Yang let loose another uppercut which nearly knocked Roman's block off. Instead, his head just canted back at an unnatural 90˚ angle that she tried not to notice. It would be fixed before she had a chance to look back, the revenant Neo returning with a flurry of strikes that Yang was almost incapable of evading.

"How about some _real_ help?!" With the bite of frustration, Yang went on the offensive. Gambling on a move that would brake the stagnation, she clasped the thin blade's bare edge and wrenched it towards herself. Turning the tables, she stabbed the metal with her elbow and snapped it like a twig. A satisfying sound, almost as much as the crunch when she snapped her hand and caught Neo with a backfist. Not nearly as appetizing as the squelching noise when she buried the severed tip into Roman's side. She knew that neither follow-on action would amount to much. "I could really use a permanent solution."

' _There isn't one,'_ The unbalance which his comment caused could have been fatal, so Jiraiya quickly explained. _'The_ _ **Edō Tensei**_ _doesn't have a weakness- at least the real one does. I don't know about this look-alike, but your best chance is still to take out that woman.'_

"And why the hell didn't you tell me before?!" Indignation lending her strength, she intercepted Neo before she could recover and hurled the veritable rag doll at Roman, hoping to send them both over the side. Unfortunately, it was nearly her who went over the deep end when they collided and the illusion fell to pieces.

' _I really didn't want to believe that people were still so foolish. I guess the only idiot here is me.'_

"I don't have time for this," Not for pity, certainly. But she might have taken a beat for the wisdom to sink in past her thick hair and harder skull. "I've got to catch up with Ruby!"

' _Oi! Baka, don't turn your back!'_

Roman trying to tackle her was almost expected, enough that she didn't have to look when anticipating the low sweep. Though if she had, Yang would have also seen the vulture-sized Nevermore perched on his shoulder like a parrot, squawking in her ear: fool! It snapped at her ear where the cloudy Dust crystal had taken residence.

"Agh! Bastard!"

Crossing many lines with that one action, the fledgling Grimm wouldn't have a chance to celebrate its feat nor even its next birthday as it was dashed into oblivion by Yang's anger alone. Yang plucked its gemstone prize from the air and held it in her clenched fist as she turned and pummeled what was left of Roman into the concrete.

There would be even less of the man after the beating, but the action had little meaning other than sating Yang's need for instant revenge. The consequences of her inattention, however, were further reaching than her series of short punches. Foolishly, she listened only to their angry tattoo and neither the screaming in her head nor the tiptoes at her back.

When she finished with the cathartic exercise, she stared at the unconsolidated mess that was once their arch-villain. More 'empty piñata' than hollow corpse, the smashed remains looked like a cardboard cutout left out in the rain too long. Papery bits of flesh were stained with moisture that she must have realized was blood after staring at it for too long. Her knuckles were scuffed and raw after punching such ephemeral substance against the concrete backdrop.

But there was so much, too much to come from her trembling fists.

"Oh," Not feeling the wetness, but seeing it dribble down from her stomach where the jagged edge of a broken blade protruded. "That's… not good."

Not so much as feeling it yet, Yang smashed her elbow into Neo standing behind her before she tried reaching around and extracting the blade. Sadly, she wasn't nearly as flexible as her partner, and so fumbled haphazardly for the blade's handle somewhere left of her spine.

' _No! Idiot, don't pull it out-!'_ Jiraiya's warning came a skosh too late as she wrenched the scrap-metal free, stumbling a bit but fortunately not collapsing which meant that she hadn't managed to sever her spine. _'Great, now I get to watch you bleed to death. Joy.'_

"Quit bitching." Yang panted. "Isn't there something you can do? Like, heal me, or something?"

' _You're the one that looks like Tsunade overclocked her Genjutsu. The best I can do is tell you that it missed all your vital organs, somehow.'_

"Well, that's great." The bluntness of her own sarcasm nearly toppled her, and Yang tottered backwards until she collided with one of the lampposts. The resultant pain spiked open her eyes that were beginning to shut so she could then see what became of Neo. "That… I take it that's your doing."

A sinuous, fleshy, pink mound now entrapped the other girl and Yang was unable to say exactly what it looked like to her. It wasn't that she balked at such crass subjects, just that her mind couldn't make the connection as it slowly shut down.

' _I supposed it is. Frankly, I'm surprised that the_ _ **Gamaguchi Shibari**_ _worked, given that the Toads of Mount Myōboku are likely extinct. Not sure how long it'll hold her though.'_

"Long enough for me to take a breather," No room for argument as she slid down the bronzed pole in a manner that was decidedly un-arousing. Not that Jiraiya in his grim concentration was going to say anything. "Thanks, by the way." She opened the hand not smeared with vital essence to see the lecherous hermit's humble existence. "Sorry I didn't listen, I know I can be pretty hot-headed."

' _Not the worst I've seen.'_ He grumbled in a way that conjured Yang's father, thought she struggled to fit him to that frame. Taiyang was a loving father and a serious teacher, whereas the picture she had of Jiraiya was a blend of both- though that could also be her vision which was starting to swirl. _'My former student did something similar- no, actually that's a lie. Naruto pulled_ _ **many**_ _such stupid stunts.'_

"Did he?" Yang giggled airily, eyes wandering to the slowly growing mound of Roman. "And here I thought he was being responsible with my sister. He and I may need to have a talk."

' _Good luck with that. I tried forever and it got me nowhere.'_

"Maybe he's different now… Hey, Teach?" It was a race, knitting flesh versus some ungodly being molding a sandcastle out of the recently dead. Yang felt herself healing slowly, slower than Roman was reassembling and slower than Neo was clawing her way out of the summoned esophagus, but for once she waited patiently. "Do you think… do we change, after we die? Or is it just more of the same?"

' _That's not a question someone like you needs to ask.'_ More of the tenderness buried in solemnity, his words were like a leaded blanket lulling her to sleep. _'Someday, perhaps. Not now.'_

"M'just wonderin'… dun' need to be so serious…"

' _Yang, don't fall asleep. You still have to catch up to your sister.'_

"Just restin' my eyes… I got time for that…?"

' _Girl, don't you do it. I'm into a lot of things, but necrophilia isn't one of them. Speaking of,'_ Roman was just about consolidated. But rather than renew the assault, he shuffled over to the summoned organ and began tearing away at it from the outside. This strange behavior gave Jiraiya hope that things weren't irreversible- if they weren't too late. _'You need to get off your shapely rear and deal with Punch and Judy over there. Oi! You listenin' to me? Yang!'_

"Five more minutes dad…" Eyes already shutting, conscience already gone.

But it wasn't her father coming into focus in those peephole apertures. It was her mother, stepping out from the eye of a crimson storm having aged not a day from dream she haunted.

"Mom?" Suddenly very much awake and alert. Despite that, widening eyes continued to drink in the appearance as if it were a dream.

Not weighing in, the stone-faced woman tread fully out of her portal and turned to the equally apathetic Roman who had halted in light of this miracle. With a movement so fast Yang question whether it really happened, Raven Branwen drew her ōkatana and pinned the unbreathing body to the ground. Then she left it there, turning to the daughter she had not seen in nigh on a decade.

"Yang."

Acknowledging her at last, admitting that this wasn't a near-death hallucination and that the torn corner in all those photographs had finally been returned. It should have been a heartwarming, tear-jerking and all-around joyous occasion, current setting notwithstanding.

-A true miracle, as Yang forgot her injuries by the wayside and stood up for this momentous happening.

"Why-" Confronted with that stern visage so alike and yet so dissimilar to her own, it ordered her to use her words _like a big girl_. "What are you doing here?"

"It's time to go." The sky was literally falling down around them as the airborne Grimm dove to join the frenzy on the ground, the world on fire as far as the eye could see.

"Go?" The portal was not two-way, nor would it take her where she wanted to be. "Go where?"

"Home. Away from here." Raven's fleer dismissing not just Beacon and Vale, but the world at large with the same kind of judiciousness most housewives might judge produce.

"What? No!" What Raven failed to grasp was the contradictory nature of her words. For Yang, home was right where she stood. "We can't just leave! If Vale's in danger so is Patch, and my friends are still fighting to protect it. So is Ruby! -Ruby! We have to help her!"

"Why?"

Only a question, only a single word which added to the handful Yang had ever heard from the woman who birthed her. What was left unspoken in this implication could have filled in the pages of the Old Testament, the cut-scenes of Dante's Inferno, with enough left over to write a pleading confession.

"Mom, what-"

"That's right, I am _**your**_ mother." Taking another step forward further juxtaposed the differences between the two women, rather than highlight their similarities. "I've let Tai indulge your flights of fancy for far too long already. Look where it's gotten you! About to lay down your life as Ozpin's lapdog. It's high time I stepped in and correct this frivolous behavior."

" _Excuse_ me?!"

Yang could handle both insult and injury. It was a part of her gregarious personality, her Semblance making sure whoever dealt her the offence had it returned twofold. This was a different kind or wound, however. Residing next to that pinch in her gut, instead it niggled at her soul, festering until such a time when it could explode with a violence of a dying star.

"I've made my apologies for being a bit rambunctious, but where were _you_ for the last fifteen years? The only reason I know what you look like is because I spent that time staring at a photograph trying to track you down."

"Exactly." Raven intoned, not realizing that her words were incomprehensible. "As you see, it was a complete waste of time. So was whatever you hoped to accomplish here. You may have gotten some training at Beacon. But if I had been allowed to take you, I could have made you strong, enough that this wouldn't have been an issue for you."

As if she were merely waving her hand, Raven withdrew her sword and decapitated both Roman and the reborn Neo before plunging it back through the headless corpse and securing it there.

"If I had raised you, you might have actually been useful." Condescending, looking at her own progeny not unlike the corpse under her boot. "Though I suppose Ozpin must have trusted you, enough to lend you one of _Them_."

For all her detachment, someone like Raven could easily interpret the question yet to be asked.

"What? You think I did not know?" Arms folded in scolding opened to spread their derision. "All of Remnant knows! It is a secret kept in plain sight, impossible to deny what everyone feels, sees, hears. Yet this is exactly what Ozpin deigns to do. He perpetuates his own mythology so he can secure the loyalty a private little faction. Look at yourself, Yang! You are where I was not long ago. A tool, a pawn in this conflict that has been going on for eons. This isn't your fight."

"You're wrong." A simple fact. Yang had shelved her animosity moments earlier to make room for the genuine concern she heard in her mother's voice. "They're threatening my friends, my _family_. Of course it's my fight! You think they're going to stop if I suddenly tell them I don't want to play anymore?" Yang gestured to the undead who wouldn't let even the end of the world stop them.

"I know that if you simply take that Dust crystal and toss it over the edge, they'll follow it." Raven stepped further away from that edge, closer to her daughter who stood with more defiance than she had a right to. "Power is dangerous if you don't know how to use it, and as long as you hold a piece, you make yourself part of the game. You have a choice, Yang. Come with me and I'll show you just what you are capable of." She held out her open hand expectantly. "- Or, give me the Dust, and I'll make sure it doesn't fall into the wrong hands."

"What will you do with him?" Yang's hand only closed tighter around the stone in reaction. "Are you going to use him to fight against the Grimm? The White Fang? Ozpin?"

"No," Raven shook her head slowly, clearly, but it still looked like regret. "I'll destroy it. One less thing for people to die over."

Even whilst choking on this possibility, Yang had to find the strength and ask, "What about the others?"

"If I have the opportunity, I will not hesitate to use them to destroy my enemies." She cast an eye backwards at the two fumbling around with her sword skewering Roman to the pavement. "-Perhaps your enemies, if they happen to be the same. I want them to be the same, Yang. I want you to come with me to be part of the clan. It's where you belong, a place where I can protect you."

This only made things harder, the decision fuzzier. Ironically, it was the still hemorrhaging wound in her abdomen that was keeping things in perspective. Pain reminding her not to drop her guard and not to do anything rash.

"And what about my team? JNPR? The other students?" Her mouth was going dry the more blood leaked out of her, the more she was losing resistance.

"We could always use strong fighters. I have no problem taking your team nor Pyrrha Nikos. The rest…" She left that stone unturned, stepping over it to bring herself closer to Yang. "Please Yang, join us. You're my child, but I have an even greater responsibility to those who _chose_ me as their matron. I must do what I can to keep them safe."

While far from forgiveness, Yang was so close to understanding what it was, this woman who birthed her. She didn't want to but- it was impossible for her to be angry. No, anger was too blind. Righteousness too conceited. There was nothing to be opposed of and yet-

' _She's right, you know.'_ With that voice, he could have said that her mother was the textbook definition of MILF and Yang would not have batted an eye. _'As long as the temptation is there, people will fight over it. But the thing is, there'll always be some excuse to shed blood and that won't change even if we disappear. They could raze the world clean again and the survivors would fight over the remnants. It's a cycle that goes on for as long as the earth spins._

' _I've even told this story before. So why bother if we can't seem to deviate from the script? Because it's just that: a story. History isn't written, it's made. It's lived by people who have yet to make their choice. The only ones who can't seem to break free are the ones saying there's no point in trying. That's their decision, but I've always asked the question,_

' _If you have a choice in what to do, why not make it a good one?'_

Meeting her mother's gaze for the first time since she was in nappies, it really was the first time they had ever seen eye to eye. "Alright…" Possibly the last, too. "Go do your duty, and I'll do mine."

At last she had filled in that blank space in the family album. And as she passed Raven, she found the monochrome reflection of herself to be just that, an image without connection. She might as well have been a lithograph, faded and forgotten betwixt pages and marking words that time had rendered impotent.

"I can't let you walk away." Yang froze at this limitation. And as it so happened, so did Neo and Roman who had finally managed to worm his way free somehow. They stared blankly at the argument like it was the strangest thing happening in that moment. "…Not with the Dust."

Yang sighed, not turning her back.

"Jiraiya…"

' _Bah, I know, I'm more trouble than I'm worth. Don't worry, you won't hurt my feelings. You'd be better off just listening to your mother. In your current shape, I doubt you'd be able to outrun her, let alone stand a chance fighting her. But you already knew that, didn't ya Kid?'_

"Just giving you fair warning," Yang's fist tightened and the blood running down her waist started trickling faster, steaming before it could reach the ground. "… I'm about to do something stupid again."

' _I know Kid. Happens every time.'_

* * *

"Do we really need to keep going?"

Anger didn't have what it needed to survive in Ruby. Less than perennial, it was a flower which bloomed once in a blue moon and then quickly wilted under any kind of clear light. Fragile petals would collapse under a mere drop of sympathy.

"Forgive me, but you're not very good at this- being a villain, I mean."

More pathetic than a dandelion with all its pods blown away, the tattered remains of her sun dress hung off Galya's twiggy frame which twisted in the slight breeze.

"No, perhaps not." Taking it in stride, her serene countenance persevered. Though her left arm was no longer responding, she could still manage a smirk with that side of her mouth. "But that's why we keep trying, isn't it? To be the best we possibly can be, none could expect the goal to be easy."

"Of all the things you could have done…" Ruby was frowning, hand gripping hard on _Crescent Rose_ so that it wouldn't go anywhere. "Why? Why be this way? I don't understand."

"And, if I were to ask you the same question," Audibly straightening herself against a slab of concrete that was once horizontal, Galya wiped off a small blemish from her smile. "Why did you choose to be a 'Hero'?"

"I'm not-"

"You didn't have a choice." Cutting Ruby off with a crack as she popped her shoulder back into place, Galya tried flexing the limb and winced, knowing intimately just how bad it was. "You care too much. That's who you are, it's the quality you hold above all others and there's nothing to do to change that. You will lay down your life without a second thought for the ones you love, and the ones you love will always exceed the ones you hate.

"For me, the number is a lot smaller. That's because my trait is loyalty. It was bred into my being, selected just like my parts so I wouldn't betray the ones who assembled me." Fingers massaging her tender muscles dug in deep, pinching out a hiss and stretching the smile on her face into a leer. "-But the way I figure it, they turned their backs first. Bringing me into this world was the ultimate betrayal! I was born as nothing more than an experiment. A show dog. You see though, the problem is that they wanted their pet to be smart, to do tricks for them. I learned, and I learned exactly how long my leash was.

"I learned what I was… I'm still a mongrel. Just like a tiger can't change its stripes. But I wanted to choose my own master! Luckily, hehehe…" Ripping back the curtain of hair to flaunt the Dust which had wormed its way into more than just her skin. "They gave me one that I approved of."

' _Humans aren't tools…'_

While Ruby wanted to agree with him, there was the unfortunate reflection she couldn't help seeing as it was cast in this pale light.

"He showed me how to escape my cage." Treating the hardened stone with more delicacy than she showed her own body, Galya caressed its dull facets and fingered the silver wire stitching it to her head. "He showed me what lay outside my tiny reality. More than that, he showed me the universe which existed inside of myself, conjuring dreams where there had been nothing before but the grey steel walls. With mere words that I'd never heard before, he willed into being that magic called 'potential' and told me I could do anything I want to. He healed me."

She stood up. Yellow Aura cascaded down her arm fluidly, not forming the razorblade talons she had been using for weapons until this point, but simply pooling into the ground and seeping through the fractures both microscopic and vast.

"Loyalty demands I return the favor. I wanted to be the best, to show him just what I could do with this life he gave me. Not merely useful, not just a vessel or a tool or a dog- I want to be a wolf! I want to be the Alpha- and the Omega- perfection!"

Enraptured as she was by the near-maniacal confession, Ruby was surprised when the battlefield once again erupted in a shower of fractured concrete and twisted metal. Moving a hand in front of her face and _Crescent Rose_ in front of everything else, she avoided most of the crass shrapnel. But she still endured the hard rainfall on her head and felt the sting of dust which made her eyes water and blurred the truth further.

"Although, this isn't possible, is it? We can't have it all- certainly can't be everything. Can't be both shield and sword, we must accept our limitations and be content with one or the other. Even the Sun has its Moon, man his woman. There must be both light and dark, good and ill."

Ruby felt ill, sick to her stomach and weak in the knees. She wanted to blame the debility on whatever it was she inhaled. And while she was at it, she might as well blame the dust for the tears flooding her eyes and the twisted image framed there.

"… And the teacher will have their student, mother their child."

Summer Rose stared back with eyes that were unclouded but still murky, blacker than the gaps between stars.

* * *

" _Twenty meters in, transitioning from recent excavation to the historic passageway. Floor is evening out to a standard grade, still proceeding with caution."_

" _Yay, no more crawling on our stomachs like those animals."_

" _It's amazing that any of this architecture survived. I mean, what is it, like, 20,000 years old?"_

" _What's amazing is that someone wants to blow it up. Fucking darkie, almost as bad as Faunus."_

" _Watch your mouth, Simmons. This recording is for official SDC records. No chatter unless it's absolutely necessary, we don't want him to know we're coming."_

" _Sorry Sarge."_

" _Fifty meters in, we've descended almost 25 meters vertical and are approaching the first switchback. According to the foreman, after which comes the central chamber."_

" _Watch your step. Once we make the turn, lights off, weapons free."_

" _Rodger, switching to IR and thermal."_

" _No light up ahead. His generator must have run out of juice."_

" _All the more reason to keep quiet."_

What remained was the mute shuffling of rubber boots on the incised steps as the Special Atlesian Guards team picked their way carefully down the narrow corridor. The way ahead was crammed into their reticles, forced into fuzzy shades of green and populated by hunched, inhuman shapes. The darkness was so heavy it felt like they were deep sea divers, swimming in their hermetical gear down to a sunken wreck.

They came to a shuffling halt just short of the main chamber. Normally, their breacher would move to the fore to clear the way and kick off the assault. But there was no room for that kind of maneuver in the cramped passageway, and so the flashbang was passed in a bucket line up to the pointman who accepted it wordlessly.

One hand on the grenade, another hand rested on his shoulder prepared to give the signal. A stiff pat from his CO and the lead soldier pulled the pin, released the spring-loaded spoon which clattered against the stone. He lobbed the cylinder into the open room.

"Go, go, go!"

-And it was promptly chucked back in, pinging off the low ceiling before detonating in the small gap above their heads.

Private First-Class Griff Thorn wasn't exactly sure what had happened. Being first in line, he had rushed in just after the grenade to make room for the rest of his team to exit the hallway. It wasn't unusual for pushing to be involved in such a high-stress and swift operation, and sometimes even professionals tripped or stumbled in the act.

This didn't feel like that. This felt like their battering ram had slammed into the back of his helmet and knocked him off his feet- maybe even knocked his head clean off as he couldn't hear or even see a damned thing. His NVG's were totally useless, showing him nothing but a white snowfield. He was going numb swimming in it, trying to figure out which way was up.

Suddenly a hand grabbed him by the drag-handle of his vest and hauled him back- he thought it was back, but it could have just as easily been further into that hell. They pulled him along as he remained limp, until at last he could feel the shallow steps skidding under his heels.

They were retreating.

Most of the defunct raiding party were too busy fumbling their way back to the tunnel, so Basayev took it upon himself to make sure they had all their casualties in tow. After moving one that looked to be unconscious, he hung around a few moments longer and listened to their groping efforts as they blindly made their way back to the surface. When the disoriented shouts and clomping of boots started to definitively fade, he picked his way over to the crates and slid back into his seat. Settling the headset back on his covered head, he winced slightly as the boom caressed a fresh gash caused by an undisciplined trigger finger.

"Sorry about that." He said as blithely as he could, "Where were we?"

" _You didn't kill any of them, did you?"_ Exasperation, or so he would like to believe, came in a sigh over the line. The signal still as solid as ever, even after the team's effort to sever the cable.

"Don't think so. I mean, I _tried_ not to." Gratefully he set down his submachinegun on the crate next to him without having fired a shot. "A few of them will have to consider changing professions. I'm sure I killed a few of their careers, one way or another." His own ears were still ringing despite the plugs, his chest felt like it was buried under sand. "It's better than being dead, right?"

Winter failed to answer, and that was by far the worst thing she or any of them could have done.

"So, your turn now, huh?"

His hope was dry, just like his mouth. They had been negotiating, talking for hours now. Time ticking down on that hour glass so that he had mere minutes. The extraction team had been the black squares of the checkered flag, Winter would be the white.

"… _Are you going to make me kill you, Basayev?"_

"…No," Maybe it would be what he preferred, though never could he admit this, even to his dying breath. He would give it all just to see her face- see _anybody_ one last time.

" _Then, you're finished. You bought yourself enough time."_ Doubtlessly she had calculated the explosive charges missing from the delivery and estimated how long it would take him to set them all.

"I've been done for a long time now," He admitted with a rueful chuckle.

"… _Then, why delay?"_ She was angry, upset that he risked the lives of Atlesian soldiers- even if they weren't _her_ soldiers. He couldn't blame her, it was selfish.

"Would you believe me if I said I enjoyed talking to you?" For once, he couldn't imagine her reaction, and he wasn't sure he wanted to. Accompanied in that black pit only by the malevolent statue, he could only picture her face being just as horrid. "Maybe it's preferable to believe that. The truth is far more… the truth is that I am afraid."

Again, she didn't say anything. He didn't let her, it was his turn to talk.

"Not of dying. I don't think I'm scared of it, anyway. What concerns me, what has always worried me is that which is left behind." Hands now clasping the detonator trembled. He felt far colder than he ever had in his life, yet his reliable body rebelled against him even then and he was sweating profusely under the wool cap his little sister had knit so long ago. "…I worry that I'm making a mistake."

" _Then just give up. Come out unarmed and I will personally guarantee your safety."_ She would, she already did with a few words that weren't pleading but a pledge. Such saintly patience that he didn't deserve. _"Please, do what you know is right."_

Right for whom, was the question. Maybe he just imagined her saying that. Right and wrong were harder to differentiate than right and left in that dark abyss, and the heart was something even more illusory. When you based things on right on wrong, someone would always loose.

"I … let's hope." He wasn't sure if his smile was conveyed or if it was eaten up by the darkness in and around him. "Is the team out of the tunnel yet?"

" _Yes. No fatalities."_ Would she tell him if there were? Did she care even half as much for him as she did those hostile strangers? He found these doubts no longer plagued him.

"Good. Then pull everyone else back as well, at least behind the fence but preferably a bit farther. If that SDC rep is there, make sure he joins them. The only one who should be anywhere near is you." Demands rather than requests, though he still had one of those too. "And, Lieutenant?"

" _Yes?"_ He waited until she was done barking the commands, calm enough that she could accept one last indulgence.

"When this is over, go to Vale, see your sister."

" _Of course."_

"Mm." Satisfied, the detonator no longer felt as heavy as the weight above his head. "Goodbye then, Winter."

There was a pause where he thought the last words he'd hear were his own echo, and then:

" _Goodbye, Bruno."_

A switch was flicked, the black gave way to white.


	18. Cenozoic: Pliocene

**So, I do apologize for this being so late. School hit me like a sack of bricks. I got like 85% of the chapter done in like two days but then stalled because I realized... I'm no longer getting pleasure out of it.**

 **I will be as straight forward and blunt as possible here, I'm seriously considering abandoning this story. This will be the first time I have ever done so (officially, the rest of the stories I have written which remain incomplete I STILL intend to return to at some point). However, I am not getting any pleasure out of writing, and I don't feel as if anyone else is either. Therefore, this is just an exercise in discomfort without any real benefit other than trying my already taxed nerves. Unlike the authors who get hundreds of reviews and walk away after getting partway through, I would be willing to finish this out for just one person if they got something out of it. I just no longer feel like this is the case, even for myself. There are too many strands that I have woven myself here. While I could still tie them back together, it feels more tedious than anything at this point. So unless someone really wants more, this will be the last update for the foreseeable future. I will make an announcement of official abandonment if it comes to that.**

 **I still hope there is something to find in this chapter. Cheers~**

* * *

"Everyone, clear the area, now!"

Most did not need to be told twice, bolting, scrambling- limping in the case of the unfortunate Guard team who hardly got a breath of fresh surface air before they were hauled to their feet and out of the chain-link cage. Some- one in particular was slightly reluctant, and Winter had to forcibly drag the self-important Sergeant out by the scruff.

"If you can see the fence, you're not far enough away. Move!" She yelled, giving the man a literal boot.

" _And, Lieutenant,"_ Reaching the end of her own tether, Winter was swiftly jerked back by the crisp voice on the other line.

"Yes?" Demanding, not changing her voice from a command.

" _When this is over, go to Vale, see your sister."_

Only then did she realize who she was talking to, his own private thoughts resting heavy in her pocket.

"Of course." Holding a deep breath and pressing the receiver closer to her ear, she heard the faintest of satisfactory sounds. Almost pitiable.

Almost.

" _Goodbye then, Winter."_

Freezing, heart itself skipping a beat to make way for that screaming realization to reach her head. All along she had known what he intended to do. Now, she believed it. Words she'd refrained from speaking came into existence.

"Goodbye, Bruno."

And so, the end came, not with a bang- not at first. Initially it was simply a click as the line was forcibly severed. Explosions came later. A dull, rolling thunder leagues away shook the ground under her feet as the charges went off sequentially.

Then the ground surged, a whole mountain rose into the sky like a giant lifting a piecrust to sneak a bite of filling. She didn't even realize it at first because she too was thrown upwards, weightless for that brief arc of time before it all came crashing down. The mountainous pastry crumbled as soon as it touched base, caved like a soufflé and outgassed a wave of dust and grit. What remained of the tunnel mouth belched out a concentrated stream of stale air and debris, bowling Winter over as she stood in front of it.

Eventually the storm blew over, the ground stopped shaking and Winter emerged from the homogenous blanket of dirt. Leaving a fetal outline behind, she sat up and let the loose dust cascade off her uniform which would never be white again. Lungs were cleared of mud with a rasping hack, but her eyes would remain irritated for days.

She herself was far past such shallow emotions as irritation, annoyance; past rage, beyond disbelief and above remorse. Standing, she found herself above it all, higher than the once lofty peak. Where the mountain once stood was now a mere mound, a pile of dirt and dust, and a grave for so many hopes.

"Well," She whispered, coarse grains pushing back against grinding teeth, "What now?"

"Lieutenant!"

Perhaps the person she least wanted to see right now. Though, to be fair, the only one she'd probably accept was buried under hundreds of tons of earth.

"Sergeant," She acknowledged his presence with the same sort of dignity expected of her, accepted his offering of a handkerchief likewise. Nothing to show that anything out of the ordinary happened, she still had absolute control of the situation except for that spot of dirt on her face.

"Lieutenant, the SDC representative has arrived." With the frivolous thing covering her mouth, she grimaced. "How are you going to explain this?"

Scoffing, coughing another wad of grit into the borrowed tissue, Winter tossed the sullied cloth back to its owner flagrantly.

" _You_ can tell him whatever you damn-well please, _Sergeant_. I stopped taking orders from Schnee a decade ago!"

Not going to be given a moment of peace, she took it for herself. She turned her back on the man and walked a few steps closer to the former mount. Silica ground to the size of snowflakes continued to rain on her head and shoulders, getting stuck in her hair and making it simultaneously dull and shimmer.

There was nothing left to say, no one to answer to, barring herself. What had she been thinking- if anything? She tried to rationalize inexplicability, marching motives up one by one only to reject their guilt. Fear? Empathy? Sympathy? Pity? Love- none of these fit the profile. Perhaps, as much as he did, she wanted her decisions to be meaningful. To make sense out of this parody.

"Lieutenant Schnee!" Persistence was about the only thing the Sergeant had when addressing her. Any confidence was lost with the way his moustache twitched in fright when she turned to glare at him. Even his loyal dogs quavered under her gaze- beaten curs who could hardly hold keep their weapons from shaking whilst pointing her direction. "Under the charges of gross negligence, dereliction of duty, and suspected conspiring with saboteurs, I hereby remove you from your position effective immediately!"

She might have asked how he intended to make good on this declaration, but she could already see the SDC honcho and his entourage ambling their way up the slope from the harbor. One didn't need binoculars or be a Faunus to see the angry cloud they dragged along with them. And in that respect, she couldn't blame the Sergeant. He was simply doing his job and could imagine nothing greater than duty to his superior.

There was also duty to oneself. And as Winter was figuring out, an obligation to the future.

"Gods' mercy…"

One of the quailing soldiers couldn't even keep his hands on his rifle any more and dropped it, letting it sink barrel-first into the loose sand. If it had been any other time, Winter might have marched over and shoved the gun back into his hands accompanied by a harangue on weapons-care that would make the man beg to swim back to Atlas on his own.

She didn't, obviously. His exclamation was one of breathless reverence which could have been easily mistaken for fear. Not of her, but for whatever now tie-dyed the landscape in a miasma of color.

Ignoring her accosters, Winter turned to see it for herself.

From out of every crack and crevice poured a stream of light that seemed almost tangible, energy so thick it was like the fog which once smothered the islands. Gossamer strands of ether in every shade imaginable- and a few she was sure no one had ever dreamed before- slithered and snaked their way into the sky, wove themselves into a massive pillar that dwarfed any human construct modern or ancient. This veritable Tower of Babble left them speechless in its majesty, groping towards the heavens with millions of tiny fingers. Reaching apogee, they then mushroomed out across the stratosphere. Vines of light spread to ever corner of the compass rose and crawled their way to the horizon.

Indescribable in its entirety, unfathomable in its most basic aspects. Unbelievable to all but a select few who desperately wanted it to be real.

"Beautiful…"

* * *

It was said that the first immigrants to Atlas walked there all the way from Vacuo, across the continent of Saunus and over an ice-bridge that formed during one of the coldest winters Remnant had ever seen. Supposedly, this frostbitten season which lasted nearly one hundred years was rumored to be due to a worsening of relations between the Brother Gods after their creation of Mankind and Grimm.

Eventually it thawed, as all immortal angers do. Though it still happens occasionally that an especially cold Winter will roll in and freeze the strait between Saunus and Mantel so that one could walk out into the middle of the ocean if so desired.

And this is exactly what Atlesians do. Ignoring the historic reasons for their emigration, ignoring the infelicitous myth, ignoring the potential danger such an escapade might bring, it remains a tradition to make the sojourn whenever possible. On the occasion, thousands make a pilgrimage to the Zehe peninsula with their families, insulated picnics- and of course, ice-skates. It is a time for celebration for the normally severe populace, a day to ignore prudence and logic to mark their shared miracle.

Survival.

The Gryphon's eaglelike claws rent her white wall like paper, talons somehow passing her by on either side and slivers of ice raining down on her bowed head. She had escaped death, again.

With a yell to reaffirm her life, Weiss stabbed _Myrtenaster_ into the ground and restrained the creature with glyphs that grabbed onto its ridiculous mass. Infuriated wingbeats tried to lift it off the ground, kicking up a torrent and fanning flames across the stadium. But it was a miracle that the gargantuan creature could fly at all, and gravity would not be denied this time.

"Now!"

Over her hunched shoulders Blake flew like a cat out of a bathtub: disheveled, frantic and out for blood. She dumped what was left in her magazine, spewing bullets in the general direction of the Grimm's face before setting foot on its beak which gaped in an undignified scream. Not pausing for a sneer, she hurled _Gambol Shroud_ past its bugged eyes, removing one and harpooning the sword into its shoulder-blade. With the silken tether wrapped around the hilt and her hand, she slung herself forward before it could swat her off like a fly. Ripping out her weapon on the way past, she made sure it wasn't a clean cut as she leapt off its back and to the safety of the shadows.

The beast could shriek indignantly as much as it wanted, there were just a few rules in life that even gods and monsters couldn't flaunt: Gravity wins eventually, Death comes for all, Entropy will reduce everything to nothing, and its duplicitous brother Chaos will make sure none of it happens in the way we expect.

Missing the cat-Faunus with its own feline tail, the Gryphon absently ripped one of its claws off the ground to swat at her again. Only, the glyph was still holding it, so the swipe was accompanied by a large chunk of concrete like a wad of gum stuck to its hoof. Less an inconvenience for the monster, the fractured block was incidentally swung over Weiss's head. It barely caught the knot to her ponytail and knocked her on her back in a daze.

"Weiss!" Someone called.

"It's… alright."

She was skating on that blue ice tongue, far out where the sea and sky and land all blended into one. Without a care, without her usual minders whom were naught but ants on the backdrop of powder sugar. Giggling as she twirled and pirouetted, tumbled and picked herself back up. Fingers tingling through her sheepskin gloves, cold to the bone, but warm in the heart.

' _Now is not the time for reminiscing.'_

Eyes shot open, she picked herself off that numbing ground- remembering the cold, tenuous reality and not the blue sea of ice. The soldier beetles which carried her to safety scattered as she got to her feet.

"You good?" The Faunus- the _other_ Faunus, Sun Wukong asked her.

"No," Weiss shook her head, shaking away the last of the flakiness. "But I'm alright."

"Glad to hear it. Sage and Neptune are ready to move Scarlet," It had taken them longer to make a stretcher than it had for her to heal him. Correction: for Shino and his loyal allies to eat away at the necrotized tissue and stem the blood. But now they were ready. "Think you can help me give them some cover?"

"Of course." Unconceitedly. Where before she would have scoffed at the foregone conclusion, now she simply promised to do her best. "On your mark."

Blake joined them as Sun alerted his shorthanded team, leaving the Gryphon to amuse itself with her clones and chase after shadows.

"Ready?" He asked, trusting the huntresses to know what they were doing. His ambulatory teammates were merely waiting on him to give the signal, ready to make a run for it with their wounded teammate saddled between them. "Go!"

"And where do you think you're going?"

A false start, jerking the patient and tripping up the coiled huntresses.

"What the hell are you doing?!" Sun challenged the interlopers standing in the way of the stretcher-bearers. "Let them through! If you want to help us, focus on that thing!"

"And who says we want to help you?"

More troubling than the cries of the Grimm was this sinister inuendo, enough that Weiss and Blake turned their backs on the beast to focus on the newcomers.

"Well if you're not going to fight," Sun continued unaware of the threat. "Then just don't get in our way. If you're smart, you'll get the hell out of here!"

"Again, you're making assumptions." Chided the male of the duo.

"Yeah, like assuming Mercury here is smart." Snarking at her companion, the green-haired girl took a daunting step towards Sun's teammates.

"Be careful with that sharp wit, Em." Baring his teeth in a grin like a mad dog, Mercury briefly turned his gaze on his partner. "You might just hurt yourself."

"If you two are done with the married couple act," Finally catching on, Sun took a step towards his teammates with his weapon locked in bo-staff form barring the way. "You can tell us why you're here. Or better yet, leave, before you both get hurt."

"Don't strain your brain too hard, Monkey-Boy. We're not here for you. Although," Discordant when socializing, Mercury and Emerald were in sync when it came to discord itself. All it took was a half-nod to his partner to set things in motion. "Your teammates would make fine hostages."

Before they could blink, the Verdant woman was holding up the injured Scarlet with a gun pressed to his temple and her other hand snaking around his waist. "Ah, ah, ah." As his team jerked towards her, her fingers wormed their way into the young man's open wound and coaxed out scream.

"Ooh, looks like it hurts," Mocked Mercury with his hands on his hips. "Kidding. I actually don't give a shit. I could watch him die as easily as I could see the four of you walk, limp, whatever- away. Our beef isn't with you, you're just a… convenience to get what we want."

"Which is?" Biting out this question, Sun didn't need to chew it much to conclude that they were being marginalized again. His pounds of flesh meant nothing to these two.

"You want the Dust, don't you?" Blake made the supposition, looking even more pissed than Sun himself.

"Got it in one." Turning back to the other Faunus, Mercury shook his head. "Man, that really sucks, don't it? Getting burned for just trying to be a nice guy and lend a hand. That's why I'm such a bastard."

"Don't I know it." Emerald caressed the blade of her weapon against Scarlet's smooth-shaven cheek.

"So-What'll it be?" Ignoring everyone who was not pertinent, Mercury handed the boy's fate to the two huntresses.

"This the Dust you're talking about?" Calmly, as cool as if she were made of ice itself even under Sun's panicked stare, Weiss held up her bracelet with the violet gemstone shimmering angrily in the firelight.

"Yup. Now, where's the other one?"

Matching his arrogant smirk, Weiss jerked her hand to the Gryphon that was slowly recognizing that its prey had disappeared. "You want it? Go and get it."

Staring at her in disbelief long enough for the Grimm to reacquire its desired goal, Mercury spat in consternation.

"Well, that's tough luck… for you."

From a standstill he exploded at Weiss, literally as gravity-bearing shotshells mounted in his artificial legs accelerated him like a human arrow at that low-hanging fruit. Too surprised to do anything to mitigate his attack- too shocked to even form a different expression than that smugness which would follow her to the grave, Weiss stood stock still while the assassin's son flew ballistically at her.

Her delicate frame collapsed under the weight of his mechanical limbs, the liquid sensation as Aura, bones and organs fell to his kick an especially satisfying feeling for the twisted teen.

What came next, was not.

"What the fuck?!" Passing almost straight through the girl, Mercury was barely able to catch himself on his feet. Harder still was figuring out what went wrong as he was blinded, his face and body covered in a sticky, gritty substance that was decided not blood.

"Like I said: you want the Dust, come and get it."

The voice registered for Emerald only moments before it impaled her. Jerking Scarlet's body in front of the oncoming thrust on instinct, she watched as the blade dissolved her illusion like salt dissolves ice. Missing narrowly with the summary first-strike, she wasn't ready for the slow-to-anger Sun who seized his chance as soon as it presented itself. Hist staff struck her across the bridge of the nose, and then she herself struck a buckled piece of concrete and bounded off, landing in a heap.

When her eyes stopped watering enough for her to open them, she looked up to see the pinhead point of _Myrtenaster_ glaring at her angrily.

"How-?"

"You're certainly quick. I suppose you practiced that being a pickpocket." No derision and almost appreciative in her redressing, Weiss didn't blink as she stared down Emerald. "-Not that quick. You're used to being able to deceive people. But you've never had to trick something smaller than a person, have you?"

Unaware she was feeling the same thing as her partner, Emerald had the benefit of understanding exactly what was crawling on her. Hordes of insects nibbled at the invisible hairs on her arms and formed chains which bound her to the ground.

"-Get this shit off me!"

It was unusual that Emerald could sympathize with Mercury. Not verbally though, otherwise she'd risk getting a mouthful of the assorted creepy crawlies which stuck themselves to her head while she was face-down on the pavement.

"The logical thing to do would be to kill you now before you give us any more trouble." Unflinching, cold reasoning such that Emerald had no choice but to believe the Schnee heiress. _'However..'_ "…But I think I'll let him do it."

Who, the girl wanted to ask. But she got her answer soon enough as Mercury let out a blood-curdling scream and she was forced to watch as the deformed Gryphon crushed him on its way towards their gathering. It even had the gall to pause and look down at its claw to check what foulness it had managed to step in.

"Y-you mother f-fucking…" Mercury cursed with wheezing breath, evidently having survived being stepped on, if just. At the sacrifice of his legs once again, Mercury was trying to drag himself away from the Grimm that was looking at him with only mild curiosity, as if wondering if he was edible or not. "Abomination!"

Somehow, this declaration decided it. The Gryphon bent down to snap up its roadkill snack when the neck suddenly jerked almost straight upwards and a jet of flame erupted from its gullet like a volcano. It kept on spewing fire into the air, writhing and flailing as it was unable to handle whatever it had swallowed previously and was now getting a sever case of… heartburn.

Blake would have chastised herself for the Yang-like thought, but she and the rest of her cohorts were busy getting themselves out of the creature's rampaging path and didn't have time for such things. Next to the grounded Mercury, Sun's teammates had the closest call as they narrowly missed being trampled by the thing as it was consumed from the inside out.

In all the chaos, Emerald had also managed to escape. But that was by far the least of their worries.

For a while they had each been keeping a tally of which was worse: the fire-bearing woman or the so-dubbed Abomination of a Grimm. The Grimm was single-minded and relentless in its goal to consume them and the Dust, backed up by a near immortality as it absorbed whatever they threw at it. Cinder had been much the same, but they had been consoled by the fact that she was, in the end, human, and could be killed.

Now, they were not so sure.

A phoenix rising from the ashes was the analogy that first came to mind and was just as quickly dismissed. What emerged from the smoldering carcass was little more than leftovers, inflammable as a tin can or glass bottle tossed into the campfire and retrieved the following morning, twisted and deformed.

" _ **You…**_ "

"Mistress!" Wading through hell to get to her patron, Emerald only considered what she was doing when the wraithlike _thing_ turned to her.

" _ **What are you doing here…Emerald?**_ "

Not answering would only prolong the death, but even knowing this didn't make it easier.

"W-we weren't able to get to the Maiden, we-"

" _ **Why?!"**_

Molten hands wrapped themselves around her neck, and Emerald swore that she felt her face melting by the radiant heat alone. Preservation kicking in as it had many times in the past, she was somehow able to squeeze out an answer.

"O-Ozpin! T-the White Fang. They're not- they're not here! And the Atlas Robots, they're fighting the Grimm! Nothing is going as planned!"

Rewarded as the bearer of bad news, Emerald was tossed aside and thankfully clear of the burning debris. Though she did not stir once she hit the ground, even when Cinder emitted a scream that could rouse the dead.

" _ **This is all your fault, Torchwick!**_ "

"Think she's angry enough at him to let us go?" Weiss asked with obvious sarcasm, ushering the stretcher-bearers away as hurriedly as possible.

Once she was done cursing the heavens, Cinder turned her sights on them.

"Doesn't look like it." Blake remarked, one-upping her teammate and turning to the team from Mistral. "Sun, you and the others get out of here, now."

"No way! Are you kidding me-"

But Blake wasn't joking, and she wasn't taking no for an answer because it wasn't a question. It was a foregone conclusion, the simple way things worked if they wanted at least some of them to survive this coming apocalypse. As indelible a law of the universe as ever was, you couldn't get something from nothing.

Someone always had to pay the price.

"Hey Blake, you know what's… funny?" Not watching team SSSN as they departed, there were no words to share with the living. Those already dead were a different matter. "I know I haven't been perfect, but I've always tried to do the right thing. And yet since I've been with this team, every time I try to do what's logical, the crazier things become."

"That's not so strange," The Faunus smiled at what might be, ironically, the last friendly face she would see in this lifetime. "It was always like that. And it's not only you, you're just finally joining the rest of us commoners."

"Hm." Weighing _Myrtenaster_ idly in her grip like she weighed her next and likely last words, Weiss considered how things might have been different. Would acting more impulsively have gotten them any farther, or ended their journey long ago? If only she had been able to use her hereditary Semblance to summon… but none of that would have changed **her** legacy.

"I guess," Fathoming what to do as Cinder gathered her powers into a miniature sun, pretending like they could still stand a chance against such cosmic force. "I guess… what I find strange is that if I could, I wouldn't change any of it."

"I suppose that's the difference between doing what's logical and what's right." Blake sighed, "Ready for it?"

"No." Weiss choked.

"Yeah, me neither." Without even the blithe wisdom to provide her comfort, they couldn't know what came next. "On three, give it everything we got?"

"One."

"Two."

"Wha…"

"Three, Weiss."

"No, you idiot. That!" She pointed through an arcing plume to the black scenery behind.

Hardly perceptible behind the artificial dawn that Cinder was creating, the sky was undeniably changing color on its own. Her human eye had caught the shift in hue where Blake's saw the movement: A web of shooting stars crisscrossed the heavens, staining their canvas with a menagerie of unnatural shades that bled down like a multicolor rain shower. Individual, ethereal meteorites plummeted from on high, diving into the ground.

Two veered off, headed straight for them.

"Look out!"

One blew straight through Cinder's gigantic construct while the other fell just short, bursting at her feet and dwarfing the dwarf-star in shear brightness. Although, neither of the huntresses could appreciate this spectacle for the leading comet crashed in between them, bowling them over much as it had their foe.

It was so bright that skin became translucent. Everywhere they tried not to look, shadow-puppet figures danced a strange ritual on the back of their eyelids.

"Ow, my head…" Thunder washed over them much later, lightning still diving from the tiny hairs on their arms into the wrinkles of their brains. "You alright, Blake? Wait, am I alright?"

"It is likely. Why? If you have enough awareness to reflect on your own capacity, chances are good that you did not sustain any serious damage." One voice was isolated out of the continuing buzz of static. White noise, but familiar.

"… Then again, perhaps we are not qualified to make this judgment. It is entirely possible that we are both too far removed from 'normal' to be unbiased."

Monotone beneath the high collar of a jacket that covered his head and face. Sunglasses too opaque to see through to his intentions. There was nothing to distinguish this stranger from the other two who had accosted them before, nothing to decry friend from foe, nothing vouching that he was real and not a hallucination. Except…

"Wait, was that supposed to be a joke?"

"Unclear." Adjusting his glasses, not looking at them but looking _of_ them. Moving his lips invisibly, but smiling none the less. "Was it?"

"Who are you?" Chancing to pick herself up and face the stranger, Blake was suddenly less concerned about Cinder who seemed more affected by the phenomenon than themselves and was whispering crazed nothings to the blindness.

"That… is also unclear." Concealed though his features might have been, this fact seemed to trouble the tall young man who stooped over his own hands like they were unknown to him. "What are we… human? Still? Ever? Improbable. Unfathomable. However-"

"Shino?" Weiss whispered.

Perking up at the name like a forgotten tune, he regarded the pale shadow of a girl with eyes that were hollow pits.

"We… I suppose that does suffice." Relaxing into his full height, filling out that flesh which hadn't been aired in Gods-knew-how-long, Shino nodded to the person who owned his essence. "For now. We have more immediate concerns, I believe."

Aware of the many implications, both huntresses turned to face the future with a renewed sense of urgency instead of dismal acceptance.

"W-where are you…" The ghouls had left Cinder, left her barely able to stand and with a tremor in her voice as if she had seen the face of God herself. In return for the illumination, when they departed, they took something from her. Not even the brightest of flames could banish the darkness from her eyes as she scanned the landscape blindly. "Y-you can't hide from me! I-I am t-the one with true power here. Such p-paltry tricks might hide you for a little bit, b-but you'll never be able to run away from d-d-death!"

"Wait!"

Recently revenant, Emerald's verdant hair was now streaked with murky clots of blood like seaweed. Even with a visible limp, she scrambled over the debris which included the twitching corpse of her comrade so that she might avoid being caught in the crossfire.

"Cinder, let me help you!" Reaching the woman, she clutched at her idol with the promise of sacrifice in turn for a miracle. "With my Semblance I can even the playing field. Please, give me a chance!"

"No! Get off me, you useless wretch!"

Stumbling even as she pushed the desperate girl off, Cinder's actions were feeble and unbecoming of one who fancied themselves a god. But to her worshipper, those seven words might as well have been the seven plagues levied against her soul. The lost little girl, Emerald was presented with a choice then: to shrivel up and die along with the rest of the world, or to kill off her belief.

Her one remaining kusarigama plunged itself into her former patron and savior.

"AAAARRRGH!" Having heard the telltale whistle mere moments before, Cinder twisted out of the way, but only enough that the hooked sword missed her collarbone and instead wedged itself below her shoulder-blade. "H-how dare you, you little-!"

"No!" Aghast, disbelief at what her body had done, the devoted girl would rather have turned that blade against herself. She denied her actions even as the blood dribble over her fingers. "I didn't mean- it wasn't me! It wasn't me!"

"Die!"

Though Emerald herself was already dead, killed by that unfocussed stare of hatred from the one person who had given her life meaning. The flames set to cremate her were merely a formality. Continuing to be unconscious of her own actions, Emerald sat back on the rubble as Cinder's attack passed harmlessly overhead, release to the darkest part of the night sky.

"This is…" No longer concerned with her traitorous subordinate, Cinder was far more perturbed by her powers which had also seemingly betrayed her. Her body was not following her commands, roped by an unseen force. "I know this feeling… show yourself, coward!"

"Coward, am I?" Another new voice- yet not new. Old beyond years, weary, but with enough pluck to consternate his target. "Ironic coming from you."

Calculated irritability, the voice deliberately diffused throughout the darkness so as not to give Cinder a good target. So, she aimed at all of them, released a symmetrical wave of fire waist-high to try and probe her newest adversary out of hiding. Becoming frantic when this yielded nothing, she summoned her bow and started lobbing clutches of arrows in any and all directions.

"Tell me, how can a blind woman be scared of the shadows?"

"Shut up!"

Igniting herself like a torch, Cinder scattered the encroaching tendrils of shade which had been snaking their way towards her. She was so bright that the observing huntresses could barely stand to look at her. Having ducked and dodged her aimless attacks, now Blake and Weiss shielded their eyes as they patiently awaited an opening.

"No, I don't think I will." Ably ducking underneath a flock of daggers thrown at her, Cinder spun around and retaliated with a spread of arrows. "I've been silent for far too long."

"I have you now!"

Dropping her disposable weapon, the personification of fire whipped a liquid jet of flame at the presumed origin of the voice. The fire carved through concrete, leaving only molten slag and an almost unnoticeable puff of smoke in its wake.

"Tch. You wish."

Nothing more than a hunk of rock, a stone hurled at a goliath. It struck Cinder in the temple and set her off balance. Pushed by her own afterburner, she tripped over the wire strung up between the rings of the kunai thrown moments earlier. Tangled within that spiderweb, her self-induced spark ignited oil coating the wires and set the whole thing ablaze.

"AAAAAA!"

Lackadaisically ignoring the angered cries, he walked up and squatted in front of the spit roast. The incident flames served to expose his sharp features and to light the cigarette he casually retrieved from his vest. A deep drag inhaled an assortment of smoke and turned a section half as long as his thumb into ash.

The burnt stub was knocked cleanly off when the wires suddenly snapped and whipped at his indifferent visage. Simply turning to avoid damage to his actual person, with a flash he withdrew a trench knife that was as sharp as the dirty goatee on his chin and blocked the next two attacks hurled at him. Not moving a step himself, the cigarette migrated to the corner of his smirk as he watched the woman pick herself back up.

"Huh, seems even you aren't fireproof."

"You think you're so damned smart…" Seared stripes hashed Cinder's face and arms, every bit of exposed flesh on her was red and angry. Except for her eyes, which were screwed into her skull like burnt out lightbulbs.

"So I've been told." Fingers working between the loops of his dagger, he carefully plucked his cigarette from his lips and breathed smoke from his nostrils which parted like a dragon's whiskers. "But it doesn't really matter what other people think. Hell, it doesn't matter what _I_ think. The only thoughts which count are the ones turned into action." Another deep breath finished off his smoke and he flicked it off to the side carelessly. "For as smart as I'm supposed to be, it's funny that it took me so long to figure that out. Life is full of ironies, isn't it?"

"I'm glad you appreciate black humor." Somewhere between a snarl and a sneer, Cinder was not as confident as she had been and far angrier than she had ever known. "Because I'll turn it all to charcoal!"

Another dagger appeared in his hands and he swiped the both across his body, easily banishing the flames hurled his way with an X-shaped gust of wind. It was too easy, and that was because Cinder was merely using the attack as a diversion to go after the two huntresses who had been recuperating on the sidelines.

Unexpectedly thrust back into the middle of things, Weiss thrust her weapon forward and summoned a glyph that halted the projectiles hurled their way. Reversing the direction, she returned the attack with her teammate following soon after.

 _Gambol Shroud_ flowing behind her like the arrows' fletching, Blake swung an overhand strike at Cinder that sent the woman to her knees even though she was able to block it. Blind as she was, it was a credit to her skill that the woman managed to keep up with the duel even after Weiss caught up and made it a trio.

Both huntresses were forced back by the sheer freneticism, but the wake left an opening for the dagger-bearing teen to take a stab or several at her. Though seemingly to no avail, as the man was clearly not as an experienced melee fighter as their enemy, or else groggy from his millennium hiatus.

"Do you see?!" Frustration washing over Cinder as she began washing the stadium clean with fire. She brought down massive chunks of concrete and metal floating on a lahar of magma. The three dissidents hopped from island to spit, trying to stay ahead of their destruction. "Everything you do amounts to nothing! You will never beat me!"

"You really are blind." Another cigarette finding its way into his mouth, another confident smile joining it. "Everyone looses eventually… given enough time."

With the whole area bathed in heat, Cinder could no longer discern the temperature gradients separating a living body from the background. Now truly blind, she flailed her swords back and forth trying to stave off an unseen enemy. Blades beating the air like wings, she didn't notice the difference until it was stabbing her through the stomach.

"You-you-you-"

"Insects?" Atop a commandeered Rapier-Wasp the size of a car, Shino was clearly taking some amount of grim pleasure in his current position. "Always humans equate insects with insignificance. Why? Individually, most are easily dispatched and relatively harmless. Even the largest of swarms are admittedly susceptible to dangers such as rain, wind… fire."

Hopping from his mount down to her level, Shino crouched and extended his hand so that even with the stinger pinning her to the ground, Cinder could see the trivial-looking bug perched on his finger.

"However, even something as small and fragile as this, _Agamopsyche threnodes_ , can act on something larger than itself." Spreading its wings, the little insect fluttered over to Cinder's face which was scrunched up in agony. "I believe the expression is… a moth to a flame? This is too blanketing a statement. Like with humans, inducements are seldom universal. This genus of moth is ectoparasitic, seeking a host that will carry it through metamorphosis. Therefore, it is just as concerned with the life of its host as its own."

Dismounting from the dying woman, the moth flapped its wings and joined its brethren encrusting the Grimm's head, burrowing in and releasing chemicals that would command the larger insect to their bidding.

"Often it seems, the host has no idea its being controlled. And neither does the moth truly control the host. Both are working on directives beyond themselves." Shino regarded her as she clawed at the stinger piercing through her gut, watched her with multitudes of eyes spread throughout the stadium. "I fear I may have lost my touch but… is this what you call irony?"

"Good enough for me." Putting away his knives, the other male joined his counterpart on that isolated stage along with the two members of RWBY. "Anyone have anything to add?"

With more words than he had spoken in the last century out of the way, Shino stood silent. Sickened, relieved, astonished and beyond all, confused, neither Blake nor Weiss could fathom on what could be said.

"F-f-fuck y-you…"

But Cinder did, and she did her best to glare at them. Unable to see, hardly able to crane her neck, the effect was less than impotent.

"Troublesome woman."

There was a distinct acidity in his pronunciation, turning those familiar words into a dagger. The shadows underneath Cinder reached up and wrapped themselves around her neck. With a swift move, they made sure that she would no longer be an issue for them.

Things became still except for the possessed Rapier Wasp which alighted delicately on the cusp of their platform, waiting for instruction. Cinder's body slid off its stinger and into the lava which was rapidly solidifying, halfway entombing her with her blank amber eyes staring up at the stars which had once again revealed themselves.

"So…" The girls started, looking at their counterparts, their _partners_ in the flesh.

"You don't have to say anything." Sighing, Shikamaru as they now knew him, patted his vest, looking for something to rectify the unlit cigarette in his mouth. "Nothing needs to be said. We don't even need to understand it. Not yet, anyway."

"Why? Because your world is still in peril, and time is of the essence."

"And… you're going to help us?"

Blake wasn't sure if she was skeptical or simply untrusting. She wasn't sure why she should be- shouldn't be. These were supposedly people they had known for months now, and yet they didn't really know anything about them, did they?

"Troublesome woman." Shikamaru muttered almost nostalgically as he gave up his search and tossed the moistened butt onto the glassed ground, much to Blake's relief. He smirked.

"Do you really need to ask that?"

* * *

Aura was truly amazing. It lent a person extraordinary strength, stamina and longevity. It could protect against both blunt-force trauma as well as piercing blows that would rend human flesh like the skin on warm milk. And even if an attack managed to sneak through its protection, it could heal those wounds at an accelerated rate. These were traits which had saved more than one life in the past.

It was kind of like Time. Taking a minute-long breather did wonders for endurance. One could only become stronger over time, and it was said that Time healed all wounds. Another trait shared by the intangible quantities was that people became dependent on it always being there.

Thus, when it ran out, usually they were fucked.

"This is nice, right?" Talking out of the corner of her mouth, out of the other side Yang spat a wad of blood and- was that a tooth? "Great mother-daughter bonding time, it's a wonder we didn't do this sooner. Would have been heaps of fun growing up- 'cept that I guess you were too busy with your cult."

Aura gone, strength gone, seconds ticking away, all Yang had left were words to hurl at her mother. That, and shear bullheadedness.

"It really is a pity." With a tone that insinuated it was anything but, Raven stalked the distance to her offspring without fear. She loomed over the blonde lookalike without any sign of remorse for the beating she had inflicted. "Had you lived with me, I would have been able to teach you when _not_ to antagonize your opponent."

"I'd tell you to go F yourself, but you know what? You're not even worth the swear-jar."

Not rising to the bait, instead Raven lowered herself to her daughter's level, crouching so that she was eye to eye with the girl who was on her knees.

"I could have killed you a dozen times over. I could have retrieved the Dust crystal from your severed hand. I could have made you hurt in ways that would be painful for such a naïve girl to even _think_ about. But I didn't. You know why?"

"Because I'm your precious little girl?" Yang mocked sarcastically though it hurt to do so. The wound in her stomach had healed up but she had broken a few ribs on top of it. There was still enough blood swimming around inside of her that when she hocked a spit at Raven it was streaked with red.

"No." Surprising not only because of her one-word response, but also for that cool countenance as she wiped away the spittle from her heart-shaped face and whispered in Yang's ear. "It's because _you're not worth it_."

Proving her wrong, Yang payed her back for the words with a headbutt that Raven should have seen coming.

Instead, she recoiled, Raven felt her face flush with blood of anger and what she suspected was a broken nose. Touching her cheek revealed more than that. Excoriated flesh was peeling away from half her face with the rest being rubbed raw.

"What the f-"

"-I've never been the _sharpest_ knife in the drawer," From underneath a full head of blonde porcupine quills, Yang stretched her pearly-white grin stained with rust. The yellow mane on her shoulders quivered as if chortling. "But that's neither here nor _hair_ , is it?"

Like the tail of her namesake, Yang's hair lashed out seemingly on its own volition. It struck against Raven's rock-solid defense and moved her as one would wipe off crumbs from the table. As she skidded back, it gave Yang enough time to push herself to her feet. Blood as thick as oil coursed through her veins, knocking the rust from her joints and smoldering as it flowed out of the multitudes of abrasions littering her body.

In retaliation, Raven unsheathed her ōdachi for the first time in the one-sided fight.

"Hey, I think I see the family resemblance now." Yang cracked a joke and her nose back into place. With one hand she wiped off the excess blood baking on her forehead. The other gripped tighter into itself, feeling the cool energy begin to swirl around the eye of her palm. "We're both vindictive bitches, aren't we?"

"I'm sure those _friends_ of yours feel the same way." Not reacting to the violet energy beginning to enshroud Yang's fist, Raven looked her daughter straight in the eyes. "I fathom they're probably the only reason you have survived thus far. I wonder if they finally figured out what I have? That's why they left you here, alone. I can only imagine Tai was too glad to have you out of the house after all these years. And then there's your poor sister-"

What had been slowly forming suddenly accelerated, pent up anger coagulated into a violet maelstrom that crashed against Raven's two-handed defense.

"So, _Mother Dearest_ ," Voice grinding the way the energy her hand was grinding against the blade. Raven wasn't about to crack under the unexpected pressure, but her blade might. " _Who taught YOU…_ _ **when to shut the Hell up?!**_ "

Yang poured on the pressure, spent the energy she had been saving like the allowance for her motorbike in one big splurge.

-And promptly crashed.

There was suddenly nothing underneath her and she was falling forward, no helmet or airbags to brake her descent against the unyielding concrete. Her mother had just disappeared.

Resurfacing right where Yang should have known she would: behind her back with that crimson blade raised above both their heads. The energies surrounding her hand and driving her body fled like ghosts as the sword came down faster than she could hit the pavement.

The pain of impact was discreet: it only affected her entire body. Front, back, top to shapely bottom. But it was pain, she could still feel, still move! Rebounding off the hard surface, she flipped onto her back just in time to see the narrow cross-section descend upon once more, and for the final time.

*Sching! *

Coldness from the blade kissed her cheek as she stared straight up its length at the dark-haired woman looming over her.

"After all this…" Growling into the crook of her arms which rested upon her blade, Yang couldn't tell what her mother was thinking. Then again, supposed she never had. "I brought you into this world, and I have every right to remove you if you stand in my way. Yet- after all this…"

"What… did you expect?" There was no scoff, not only because Yang couldn't muster it, but because she was also worthy of its derision. Meeting her mother had been both more and less than what she could have hoped, and never what she would have expected.

Nor did she anticipate the wry smile which appeared underneath raven tresses.

"I didn't expect it to hurt this much."

Stubborn was exactly how one birthed from her body ought to be and Yang reflected this to a tee. Raven was a tough woman, immutable even as the world- _her_ world crumbled. It had been doing so for a long time, but throughout it all she had remained strong. And so, what was so difficult to comprehend now was how this girl- one which used to be so small she could fit in the palm of her hand- could affect her so monumentally.

"You'd think I'd know by now. I suppose you have your mother to blame for your foolish streak."

"Stop that." With violet eyes purpling around the edges she glared up at the woman. "Stop acting like we're ignorant children and you're the only one who knows how to suffer and sacrifice! Stop pretending like you had anything to do with my choices!"

With strength she couldn't explain, she grasped a fistful of the woman's kimono and dragged her down so that they were face to face. Forehead met forehead with the dull sound of a gavel. "This? This is everything we share. It's all superficial, just like the pain."

"Now you want to deny the commonality? You may not recant, my flesh and blood."

"-Bleeding doesn't mean you have a heart." Cruel, perhaps too cruel to be truthful. Yang softened her voice if not her death-grip, her other hand moving to the tattered sigil peeling off her shredded jacket. "I'm not… I might look like you, but I don't want to be like you. I won't ever be."

"Because you think I do not feel?" Instead of swallowing it, Raven let the sentiments gurgle in her throat. It colored her words more than anger and frustration had so far. "Am I not human? Do I not have a right?"

"No, you just don't want to." Eyes swelling, beginning to close. "I do. Even if it hurts sometimes. Even if we get disappointed by what we find in the end," Paths to glory, a yellow brick road, a trail through the woods and a red cloak bobbing along ahead, "I want to believe that can be good. That's why…"

Accepting the ephemerality of life and the perpetual ache that went with it, Yang reflected her mother's grimace and made it look like a smile.

"… That's why I'll never be like you."

Before she let go, Yang heaved her mother off, far away and out of the path of the rainbow meteor which came crashing down on her.

"Yang!"

It was all involuntary. Raven flew through the air, for once not by her own will. The words which forced themselves out of her mouth were just as ruthlessly drowned by noise, sound as white as the light which consumed her hand reaching out towards the incidence. It was a movie, colorless and silent.

The only problem was that it wasn't; it was happening to her- her _daughter_ and her, and there was nothing she could do about it. It was like death, but the pain wouldn't end.

Not even when the light faded and she could see, hear, breathe again. Moving proved to be an issue, hands reding the hackly ground which wouldn't stay still- though that could have been her trembling limbs which betrayed her like that fluttering organ in her chest.

Or, like her eyes which were compelled towards the figure standing before her.

The stranger cut an imposing profile, an impossible one as if he stepped right from that silver screen, or perhaps even a storybook. Trappings as antiquated as the trite grin stretched across his wrinkled visage. It was a face that belonged to an ink drawing or woodblock print, a countenance reserved for tales of oriental mysticism. The man was a living anachronism, having just dawdled down from his secluded cave upon a far-off mount.

Yet, as he stood there in his clunky sandals with Yang's limp form draped over one massive shoulder, Raven felt as if she were the one who didn't belong.

"-W-who are you?" She stuttered like a girl shown her first taste of magic. Though by now she ought to be an old hand at such party tricks, far too much to be impressed by people appearing from thin air.

"Hm." As a deep rumbling of thought added on top of an already daunting presence, Raven remembered that one didn't outgrow certain things. Curiosity, wonder, fear- her sword rested behind the man who, for all his bulk, looked like he could stomp her like a mouse skittering across the kitchen floor.

"You know, I normally have a prepared response for that question." There was a twinkle in his eye that claimed he still knew what to say, that he already knew everything ever said and all that was ever going to be. Shrugging his shoulder, he hefted her daughter as if she were no more than the child Raven remembered her as. "But somebody told me I have to catch up with the times. So,"

Pivoting on the pedestal of his geta, he turned to catch up with the time lost.

"Wait!"

Trying to sound assertive and not desperate, Raven staggered to her feet and fixed the man with crimson eyes that he seemed to take offense at. This was okay- for once, she'd rather be considered a threat than a triviality. That was **exactly** what she was, after all: a threat to the status quo, to anyone who opposed her, to her own family and even herself. Lack of weapon notwithstanding, her whole body was a weapon which was imbued with _**that**_ power.

Though somehow, the power which she'd protected, venerated, revered, stolen, felt insignificant. Or if not inconsequential, simply… petty. The underdeveloped argument of a child.

"What-" Was this energy she felt seeking out her own? Wafting off the man like steam from a bath, or dust off a relic thousands of years old. "…are you going to do with her?"

"This little lady has places to be." Smirking crinkled the ochre line running down his cheek like a permanent tear of either laughter or sorrow. He was doing both while talking to her, upsetting the control Raven was beginning to reform. "You're welcome to join, of course."

"Huh?"

More questions were only answered as the man kicked her sword back into her hands with his wooden sandals. With a nod, he directed her inquiring gaze over to the columns of smoke still billowing up from the arena.

"It's not hard to see that people could still use some help, someone with your skill." Still giving her that smirk Raven knew she would come to loathe. "What'd ya say, wanna turn a new leaf? Never too late for an old dog to learn a thing or two- or Bird, for that matter." The man's imperturbable countenance faltered for the first time since appearing. "N-not that you're old! In fact, I was just admiring earlier how-"

"Shut up." More chagrinned at her perceived failure than the unintended slight, Raven turned to guard the chinks in her armor. "You want that weakling? Fine. Take her and go. And tell her never to come seeking me again."

The man hummed, a throaty grumble which contradicted his momentary slip and belied the many years under his belt. A note which reminded Raven of the days she'd been bounced on her grandfather's knee.

"If that's what you want, I'm sure you won't have a problem." Few people he had known in his lifetime were that stubbornly masochistic. He could safely say that while the girl draped over his shoulder like a sack of rice was certainly the former, he doubted she would force any more pain upon herself or her team. "I wonder though if it is... There's no going back, after all."

"Go. I don't need to be lectured like a child." Though in his eyes perhaps she was, and he only confirmed this with a blunt statement.

"Well, I disagree." Raven whipped around in time to see him shrug. "But I suppose this isn't the time or place for a lesson."

Uncaring of the naked weapon at his back or the surge of anticipatory energy prickling his silvered hair, the man turned his back and strode away.

"Just remember…" He called over his shoulder. "We all could learn a thing or two from the young. Kids say the darndest things sometimes…"

Disappearing like his voice, the man bounded off into the smoky haze while Raven stood still.

* * *

Yang was moving. Rocking, undulating in a sea of twilight that was trying to lull her into a deeper slumber.

"Gnn… not so rough…"

As gentle as the process was, it wasn't working, what with the stony shoulder digging into her injured stomach with every step.

"Sorry." Sandals clacked as softly as the breaking of pine-needles as they touched down on the stadium floor. When they began moving again, it was at a distinctly slower pace. Apparently, they had time. "I told you that I'm not as good as my teammate. Although, you should have seen her bedside manner…" He drifted into bittersweet remembrance while still moving forward.

"I'll deal with it." Obstinacy raised its head for Yang who clearly couldn't. Instead, the girl sighed against the back which was both harder and more comfortable than a few floors she had passed out on after parties. Which was good, because she felt ten times worse than any hangover in memory. "Just don't let your hand slip, bud."

"Wouldn't dream of it."

Which was a strange thing to say, considering it was more than likely her dream. It was a strange dream, with a man she knew was Jiraiya toting her flaccid body and yet not trying to cop a feel. Though it was even stranger that she should accept these suppositions so vehemently, not doubting that despite her slumber, everything would be taken care of.

"So where're we goin' anyways?" Conversely, if this were her dream, why did she feel so light headed and powerless in this situation? She had no control over her words, let alone wherever this crazy tale was leading. "Gonna go see Ruby and 'Ruto?"

"Not yet." Stated with the patience of a parent on a long card ride, though Jiraiya wouldn't know this. Yang could, simultaneously whining and accepting the solidity of the dream under her hands.

"Why not? We gotta save 'er, don't we?"

Jiraiya gave a small bark, a bump in the road which upset her wounds. It was louder than even his dispatching of the Grimm which had taken interest in the pair.

"I wouldn't worry about her. She's got Him by her side." Just as Yang was drooped on his shoulder, her sister would have no problem leaning on His. And vice versa. "It's your other friends I'm worried about. Though first, we have to take care of you little missy."

"But 'm fine…"

Darkness hid the unfamiliar surroundings, smoke blocking the skies he probably wouldn't recognize when they finally cleared. But he knew this place, recognized the closeness of his person and that nostalgic tone of voice which called him back. It harkened to a time that wasn't perfect, but also wasn't quite so broken. Though the buildings once there no longer stood, the landscapes themselves unrecognizable and the people inhabiting them no longer existed, they would get there again.

"…C'mon… gotta go…"

"Impatient brat." Stopping, he shifted her weight carefully back over his shoulder instead of bucking her like he urged to do. Laughing while doing so, smiling to himself in the ebbing darkness.

"We're almost there."

* * *

There was no such thing as a perfect world.

None that they would reach in their lifetimes, at least. She'd never deny that. She didn't have to, instead letting the idea die on the vine. Believing that if perhaps the thought remained incomplete, it'd never grow to be true. But it just festered there, behind cherry lips who'd dare not speak its truth.

She would tell herself that she wasn't giving up, but she had also been lying to herself for a very long time. It was a ruse that had gone on since the last time she had looked up at this maternal visage. Not the governess of her life, she had to admit she wasn't even control of her own body.

Whose was it then? Arms and legs were conducted by strings of Chakra which took up the slack. If not for them battling in her stead, she would have perished already. Deader than her mother who became more real with each exchange. Her blood would already be cold if not for Naruto's ethereal embrace kindling her waning flame.

Then, was her life his? Undeniably his kindness was slowly but surely killing her. The same Chakra used in defense of her life was aiding its atrophy, recrystallizing the calcium in her bones and consuming her essence.

She could think of worse fates.

But maybe even then she was still lying to herself. Wanting to believe that getting up after being knocked down was her choice, and not the cruel script she was handed.

Honestly, she didn't know. She didn't _want_ to know. Ruby wanted to believe up until the very end that goodness could still prevail. His goodness, hers- it didn't matter. Did it? When even her body and mind had given up, her spirit fought on eternally.

"Good," Her tormentor's diabetic smile gazed down at her through the arch of her mother's scythe. "I like that look. It makes one want to believe that there's still hope. People say that it's like a drug, but they're only partly right."

Not letting the limp Ruby had given her slow her down, Galya rounded Summer Rose locked in her vengeful frieze and knelt down in front of the girl.

"Hope is like the air we breathe. We can't live without it, even though it's killing us."

It was true that life was far from perfect. The closest thing being the way her mother's scythe stood out against the black backdrop, a perfect crescent moon such that she'd never seen in life. Then there were Galya's eyes which twinkled in an ideal balance of wickedness and innocence. Lastly, she could never forget about that silent accompaniment, the presence which sat closest to her heart and assured her without a single word.

Actually, now that she thought about it, it was-

"Perfect…" Galya completed her thought with a breathless utterance. With the intake, she leaped to her feet and threw her hands up in exaltation of the heavens that were bleeding color. "Yes! Yes! This is wonderful!"

It had been a long time since Ruby truly believed in miracles. She couldn't afford to look at the world behind rose-colored glasses. But even then, everything had a silver lining in her eyes.

"This is how it should end!"

The shadows darkened even as the air itself lit up in an iridescent aroura, outshining the madwoman's hair as she danced around in uncontrolled elation. There was a quiet roar as light consumed everything, capturing that perfect moment in a flash.

* * *

"~A young lady leaves her mother,

with no one to love her, to protect from the world.

And I have seen the monsters,

that will haunt her, that'll tear her all apart ~"

It could have been something from her past, or perhaps a tune she had conjured up during the addled wanderings of her conscious within this immortal shell. Regardless, it passed the time. It distracted the being known as Salem from the disjointed images being returned from her campaign. Her overture involved thousands of Grimm, a hectic haptic feedback that would drive her mad if she spent too long perusing it.

Of course, some would say she had lost her mind long ago, along with everything else.

Except patience.

"~ And on her gravestone,

we will remember, just where we were when we knew she would go.

And I still remember the day that we left her,

that's when she said that she knows how it goes.

And we sang…~"

The quiet note she whispered only to herself faded faster than the pings of rock-hammers far underground. She had looked out her windows to see the sky, once as dark as a cavern's ceiling, rapidly crumbling away to a colorful cancer. Silver roots wormed their way through the black clouds and across the bleak horizon towards her sanctuary.

As the destroyer of all things in turn watched her world undergo upheaval, the rumblings of aftershock shook loose the final bar:

"~ Your day will come…~"

* * *

 **Lyrics: "Your Day Will Come" by Streetlight Manifesto**


	19. Quaternary

**So, what to say?**

 **If nothing else, I feel that I have kept my word. I was a bit chagrined to notice that a couple other people favorited and followed this story even after I had made the announcement, but only one of you was vocal enough to give me a vote yae or nae.**

 **You know who you are, and so this is for you. As much as it is for myself.**

 **I hate leaving a story unfinished, so I will try not to let it happen here. This seems to be my one saving grace in a sea of halfhearted endeavors. It is my sincere belief that we are in the home stretch here, so I will do my best not to let it stretch _too_ long. **

**So,**

 **If you'll remember those before**

 **And the ones who've yet to come**

 **Against the suffer of it all**

 **Triumphs the union of souls**

 **With only one thing on its mind:**

 **I can't go on-** **I will go on**

 ** **With only one thing on its mind:****

 **I can't go on-** **I _will_ go on~**

* * *

' _~So I will pave this road 'till glory sets our broken spirit free_

' _From every cross-soaked nail pours endless rain with tears no eye should see_

' _But they could fill our highest ocean and the rivers in between_

' _~With every blade that flowers must grow then drown with love, our cruelest sea…~'_

* * *

In a flash, everything that was once solid melted from the world.

Nothing was spared from the primordial destroyer. The very lattice of the universe was consumed with all the network of possibilities going up in flames. Heat so intense that it radiated from the present into the past and future, coddling her infancy and warming her bones in old age.

-In fact, there were no more bones, no more flesh. Stone no more solid than saltwater taffy on a hot summer's day (every summer there ever had been, unified into one), undifferentiated amalgam of identity and flavor. There was no more Ruby, no Naruto, no Yang and Raven, Galya, and no Ozpin or Salem, either. All were chewed up in that universe-devouring event like the Big-Bang in reverse, growth in retrograde and all fading into nothing.

Then, things cooled down.

Space solidified and individual realities began to congeal from the farraginous melt. As time cooled and stretched back into existence, the moment which lasted an eternity sped up and turned out to be less than a second.

She dropped from the universal womb onto newly-forged legs and kissed the ground which tasted of blood and amniotic fluid. Learning to breathe, she swallowed atmosphere which somehow recalled the dirty fingerprint laid on it from a previous life. She choked on the lingering smoke and coughed up the last memory of her prenatal journey, spitting it out on the interminable ground.

Trying to stand for the first time ever revealed her to be no more coordinated than an infant giraffe. What were these gangly limbs which grew from nothing? Were they supposed to be hers, that tiny babe once the size of a loaf of bread? These eyes that opened themselves up to such illumination hurt her, exposed her to things that she had no right nor desire to know.

Sensitive to everything, it was all painful, including the oxygen burning her lungs and the gravity which dragged her down.

However, the arm which caught her was anything but. Sturdy, yet gentle. Foreign, yet intimately familiar as if it had held onto her all throughout pre-existence and preserved her identity within its grasp. The jumbled world had demonstrated that fate wasn't real, but that everything was connected. Callused fingers now intertwined with her own, awkward figure neatly tucked into the crook of his arm as he lifted them both into uniqueness.

The words he spoke reminded her how to stand on her own once again.

"So, with a wonder and a wild desire…" Another breath, and she no longer struggled with the grittiness of the air.

"~I will crawl from under every weight, ~" No longer having to crawl around like a newborn babe, she felt herself under her own two feet while still being connected by the umbilical cord of his arm wrapped around her waist.

"~With a wonder and a wild desire, bless the day it was I shared your name, ~" The name formed on her lips before it manifested in her mind. His face was as it always should have been, smiling at her.

No time at all had passed for that youthful mien, blue eyes as eternal as the sea and hair that would outlast their central star. Only his enthusiasm had atrophied in exile. But even that was rejuvenated, like a prisoner of war finally going home the moment he _saw_ her. For the first time, he was able to witness what wonderment and hope looked like to be fulfilled, and not simply the endless reflection of it in murky water.

"Ohisashiburi… Naruto-kun."

-For the first time he had the chance to **defend** this most precious of people. With his everlasting body, Naruto threw itself in front of Ruby like he had wanted to do for so long. Impulse like this could never die. It was his forte, his noodles and broth- habits unaltered for lack of physical means.

"How… extraordinary."

Other things refused to change as well, declined to die when they really ought to and everyone else wanted them to just disappear. One of his many ghosts took an experimental step that bridged the present, and the past left undone.

"Isn't it incredible though, Naruto-kun?" It was unfortunately all too credible, the cruelly familiar smirk and the face it was attached to were nothing more than intolerable in this pure moment.

"For the longest time, I had a feeling… no, that's not true..." Giving the impression of contemplation, he adjusted the round glasses which were part and parcel of his persona. Naruto didn't believe it for a second, wishing his younger self had been as wise. "I had _wanted_ to see you again, Naruto-kun. Such odds were stacked against the happening, the universe against your success and yet…"

Having not tasted raw air in so long, the man's chortles petered off into rasping hiss like a snake. Having so long clawed at the indestructible walls of his prison, his fingers itched and burned to tear something apart.

" -Even when everything said that you would _fail_ as you did then- no one had any reason to believe that you would come through with that juvenile promise and yet _I_ did. Why is this? Apart from my own freedom, _why_ should I want to see a brat like you keep getting back up time and time and time again?" Yakushi Kabuto pontificated out loud, enjoying the way his voice smacked against the angry faces instead of echoing around inside his own head.

"Because you're a psychopath who just likes to hear himself talk." Naruto's unused voice broke like he was going through puberty again, but his stance which shielded Ruby from this madman did not quaver.

Though much like a child's tantrum, his words had little effect on the former Snake Sanin's apprentice who continued to smile but with a sardonic longing.

"I recall a little boy who also liked to run his mouth, always making promises he couldn't keep." Ochre eyes blurred in reminiscence. Suddenly they coalesced with all the focus of a viper on said little boy who didn't appear to have aged at all. "I suppose it's a comfort to see that some things never change, eh, Naruto? Maybe that's what's so satisfying about your resistance. Because it means that the world still works in predictable patterns, such that there are no new stories ever told, no songs left unsung: ~yesterday forever speaks your grave~… isn't that how the line goes?"

"Then you know how this is going to go. Should have just stayed dead, you son of a bitch."

It was as if no time had passed at all, animosities and instincts even more ancient than his hero-complex and ramen addiction seamlessly stitched themselves back into his life. This was a wound which had never quite healed.

"Naruto,"

With a word she broke the spell. And with a gentle touch, she reeled in the beast which had almost escaped with him.

"Would you look at that?" With all the interest of a coroner, Kabuto leered at their interaction. "I honestly can't tell who is better trained. This one already looks prepared to die for you. And how many of those were there before? I'd call it a shame, but they really should have seen it coming since even the 'Legendary Sucker' bet her hopes on you. Perhaps the Old Toad knew it was hopeless too and wanted to bow out before he could be disappointed by your performance."

"Bastard! I swear, I will kill-"

" _Naruto_ ,"

Not strong by any means, yet the hand that squeezed his shoulder easily plucked him from the whirlpool of hate and history. Head breaching the surface of here and now, he glanced back and met with sliver clouds brimming with rain. He drew a sharp intake of fresh air, cold and awakening, and grasped the small hand like a lifeline.

"Ruby, I-" Her eyes shouldn't look like that. How could he have made her grip so desperate-

"Naruto, swear."

What should he promise? His life was hers already, his purpose and strength avowed to whatever she should ask. If she wanted the moon to be whole, she had only to ask and he would rewind the cycles of the globe, turn back time-

"-The swear jar."

Incredulous amusement filled his expression, spilled out of the corner of his crinkled eye and spread to the grey-haired former spy. Kabuto didn't get it, and Naruto almost missed it because of all the troubles clinging to him like saltwater dredged up from his silent tomb.

He shed these burdens as easily as his sage's cloak and the mantel of Hōkage from his mind. None of these things were needed anymore.

"You're right, Ruby." He praised her genuineness with a hand of his own that he laid upon her scalp. Bridging the gap of height, of space, of age, he brought them close and rested his forehead against hers. "There's a lot that I want to say now, but there's no reason to be crass about it."

"N-Naru-"

What needed to be said was as pure as the warmth stirring from their connection. Such a spark that he hadn't appreciated before with his body being so close to hers. The flush of life he had overlooked and misunderstood for years blossomed in the contact. It reminded him of that time before time, when they were together. -Only now they were whole and distinct, this moment shared and yet still their own.

"How quaint. Another human idiosyncrasy that has overstayed its usefulness."

Heedless of the insensitive comment, Naruto assuaged the poor girl's vibrant mortification. He ruffled her Picidae hair and turned back to Kabuto who was scrutinizing an event that he didn't even grasp.

"SHUT UP!"

Kabuto was left without words- so was Naruto as the violent eruption derailed what was promising to be a rehash of their every confrontation to date. Asserting that she was more than simply there, Ruby reminded them both that this wasn't their time. It was hers.

"People like you… you don't get it! You'll never get it! Not in a million-billion years!" Ruby brushed past Naruto who wisely made room for her sweeping arms which encompassed that incomprehensible expanse of time. "It's simple! Life's simple! -Well, okay, maybe it's not, but it sure as heck isn't the way jerks like you make it out to be! Doing something good doesn't have to be complicated! You just do your best. And sure, sometimes that's not enough… sometimes you screw up… bad… but that doesn't give you a right to just give up! Life might be tough, but that doesn't give you the right to take a shortcut and leave everyone else in the dust! Even if the game's broke, you don't just cheat! That kind of selfishness- people like you, you're a- an anti- an anarchist- an arachnid-"

"An anachronism?" Kabuto offered helpfully.

"Yeah! That!" Without hesitation, Ruby threw the suggestion right back like an arrow. "You don't belong here. Not because you're a ninja or whatever, not because you're really, really, really old, but because there's no room in this world for those who don't want anything more than to tear it down."

When she finished, Ruby was as red and flustered as when she had been face-to-face with the boy she had only gotten to know as a voice. She had a voice too, wanting to shout her grievances. Being called naïve no longer bothered her, but she demanded her time as well. Time- there was always supposed to be time later for the things she wanted, yet it kept getting interrupted. Eschewed. Sidetracked. Maybe happily-ever-after was still out of her reach, but couldn't she at least get a single moment of indulgence?

"You're right." Kabuto acknowledged the girl, his smile curving like a talon, like the Chakra scalpel he formed beneath the crook of his forefinger. "-And yet, what will that get you? Still a phony, still a failure. These conflicts people like you and I have ad infinitum don't determine who is right, only who is left."

"How appropriate."

Forgotten like all the other losers of history, even Kabuto didn't notice Galya's pinprick presence until her needle was extracted from his back. She had been one with the background, a part of him for so long- or was he a part of her? The living doll didn't speculate on this, her expression totally blank as she trundled the few steps away from her former symbiote. No satisfaction or even irony as she awaited the results of the betrayal.

"My, today is just full of the unexpected and amusing." Mirroring the disinterest over his shoulder, Kabuto gave no sign that he was disturbed by the poison surely ravaging his veins. "I suppose I should ask: why?"

"It won't do much good, you will be dead soon. And as the girl said, you will not appreciate why." Though neither this nor her battered state kept the woman from divulging her reason. Even now, she still liked to talk, wanted to be heard. "I owe you everything. But what does that really mean? This toxin is derived from something you taught me. Education without which, I probably would have been stuck as my own lab experiment. Should I be grateful, even if you did it for your own benefit?

"I didn't belong there in that madhouse, nor do I belong in this world. In fact, neither of us do. The only purpose people like us serve is to ourselves. So what is it we owe one another? Now, being of no use to you or anyone, you would have killed me the moment I ceased to be of amusement."

"Too true."

As if listening to the butt of an old joke, neither looked surprised when he swiped the translucent scalpel over her throat. Such was the difference between master and student that the strike was barely noticeable, the damage taking time to burble up from within. From the beginning, the dissecting blade had been his technique- everything she did had been his inspiration, even now.

Galya smiled, floodwaters of ichor straining through her teeth and cascading over her bottom lip. Then she collapsed, no one left to pull her strings.

"I suppose you deserve an explanation too, though you may not appreciate it." Emphasizing her limited time on the Earth, Kabuto parroted her words as he turned his back on Naruto and Ruby. They weren't going to change the inevitable. "My body can repair and regenerate just about any damage done to it. Whatever mixture you pirated from my thoughts I'm already immune to. Therefore, it was a useless gesture, although I do appreciate the sentiment."

A garbled response made its way past upturned lips.

"I'm sorry, what as that?" But as he leaned over to accept her final words, Kabuto found his sense of up and down almost as skewed as his right and wrong and he nearly toppled onto his former host. "W-what… is this-?"

Fighting against a sudden jolt of alarm, he tried to keep his heartbeat steady and prevent whatever disturbance was in his blood from spreading. For the first time in… _ever_ , Kabuto felt afraid. -That's what this was. Fear, so afraid of losing his reclaimed freedom that it didn't seem real: Not his revival from the stasis, not the imminence of death, and not even the glass syringe cracking in his grip.

"This…" She jutted her chin, covered in a bloody beard. "Is something… different."

"Rasengan!"

Such wanton and meaningless violence, but Naruto would not stop now. Not until he felt the end with his own two hands. He hated to call it revenge for all the atrocities the man had committed, he hated to say it was satisfying, but that's exactly what it was. Whether it be the ethical restitution of things at long last, or the visceral pleasure of having rotten bones snaps like twigs under his palm.

Likewise, he didn't stop to question, grinding until the wisps of his attack dissipated like steam from his palm and took the last pulses of life with them. Though in the end it brought him no pleasure, at the very least it was a relief.

The vestiges of blue smoke scattered with a sigh. And as they rose to meet the fading twilight, Ruby approached the dying woman. Walking past Naruto, past the mangled corpse of his ancient enemy, she came to stand over the pitiable creature. Most of the damage had been done by her hand apart from the final blow, which was the only one still running ruby red.

"It doesn't… feel that good… does it?" Galya spoke past the brown scabs already clotting around her mouth and in her throat. Looking through the girl whose eyes shone more vibrantly than the moon, it wasn't even clear who she was talking to. "Victory… revenge... this life… it's all so… empty…" Whatever hopes and dreams she'd secretly harbored were draining faster than her lungs were filling with fluid. "Nothing… it was all for… but… realized... I wanted…"

Coming to understand that she wanted to live right as she died, it was hard to fathom she had been there at all.

Both the heroes' triumphs were the same, this resolution failing to satisfy. Therefore, Ruby tiptoed her way over to where Naruto stood, seeking solace. Himself loomed over his handiwork as still as stone once again. The scene really was just like the past, though he would be the only one to remember the irony.

Which was for the best. She drew him away from the grizzly scene, capturing his hand in her own and uncaring for the blood upon it. She knew it was there, as it mixed and mingled with her own stains.

"So… it's over?"

She asked, almost not daring to know. What was left of her mother crumbled, trickled away like the last grains in an hourglass, and she could not bring herself to watch it happen. Looking to his gaze for answers, she found his eyes focused on the equally blue horizon which was frozen in predawn.

"No," Trying to look ahead, there should have been relief in this fact. None of it was over, not their problems and not their lives. There was still time for things to get better. "Not yet."

But, time- they had time now, didn't they? As the colors dried in that picture-perfect landscape, they had enough to remember why they kept going and what it was they set out to do in the first place. A perfect moment.

"Ruby!" There was always someone calling her, from behind or ahead. She didn't want to answer, just linger in the moment which felt so much like a dream, and which had been kept from her for so long. "Na-Naruto!"

It wasn't her imagination though. It was so much better.

"Yo!" With patience and obligation, the blond turned to greet them with a wave and a smile. "Hey Yang, Blake, Weiss, nice to meet y- Shikamaru! Ero-Senin! And uh- who are you again…?"

Within his big coat Shino withered, trying not to show his disappointment with being forgotten, even if it _had_ been a long time. And because it had been such a long time, the prank meant that much more to the three old comrades. They could finally laugh at how Naruto had been so unobservant all those ages ago. And what a boisterous laugh it was, uplifting everyone with its warm eddies.

Naruto's current luminance transformed the memory of the glowing crystal into a dim bulb. Joy had been unbridled from that solemn container and was being coaxed forth by the sight of his friends at long last. True happiness shone on a face that Ruby had only ever seen carry a sad smile- an illusion of one at that. Such enthusiasm might have been enough to make her jealous.

Might have, if he were not carrying her forward every step of the way so that she could share in his revelries. With each name and greeting hollered out at the top of his lungs, his hand squeezed tighter around hers. In her withered state, he all but stole her from her feet to unite and reunite her with friends new and old.

Here was the jubilation she had been trying to capture for so long, becoming swept up in it. She laughed giddily, reveling in the irony which hurt no one. For one moment, she was happy.

But this is not how the story ends.

* * *

"What do you mean I'm not coming with you?!"

One might have imagined her voice shaking Beacon's very foundations. But for those within earshot, most had been around when the walls themselves rattled with the baying of Grimm and so they paid this little attention as they went about their business.

A few days, that's all it had taken to return to a new normal. One that was neither truly new nor normal in any sense of the word. But it worked, somehow, and so did many of the students who were now responsible for building their future in the literal sense. Brick by brick and lesson by lessons which had not been canceled in the wake of Beacon and Vale's near razing.

A few days, that's all they had gotten before life necessarily moved on. Before they had to move.

"I mean that I'd sooner see you as a _literal_ Ruby than have you on that bullhead tomorrow." Knowing he'd once been just as vocal and inflexible, Naruto tried very hard to be the mature one by remembering where these qualities had gotten him. He stood as a wall with arms folded, barring the girl from their group of revived ninja. "That should tell you how serious I am about this. I _know_ it's going to be hard for you to stay at Beacon, but this isn't like before. I can't let you come with us."

"It's because you think you're not coming back!"

Thinking too much on how _**he'd**_ respond in her place, Naruto was taken aback by Ruby's emphatic assertion. He had expected her to fight the edict, sure. Pout a bit about how unfair it was that the four of them plus Glynda were going off to fight the 'Boss', while she and her team were stuck reconstructing the school. Maybe he expected they'd try (and fail) to prove how strong and therefore useful they were.

He should have seen this coming, though. Maybe he was trying too hard not to think of the possibility himself.

"Now, now, you can't think the little Brat here would be so coldhearted," Guessing his student's loss of cool, Jiraiya butted his way in with a palm for each 'child' to tussle their hair. Unafraid of their gripes and threats, he reserved a glance towards Yang who gave him an approving nod. " _Stupid_ , yeah. But a student of mine would never leave his promised high and dry on the stoop!"

"Dam-Dang it, Ero-Senin!" Eventually Naruto managed to drive off their attacker, swiping halfheartedly at the old pervert and huffing when he missed. "Do ya really have to put it like that?!"

"Like what?"

"The whole- never mind."

Despite his feigned insult, Naruto otherwise appreciated his sensei's intervention (his mere voice, once grating was melodic to reformed ears). Though he could do without the coy insinuations regarding him and Ruby, which were surprisingly enough not limited to the ancient letch and had migrated into the huntress' camp. Heaving a sigh, he had bigger issues to worry about which also centered around the visibly distraught girl.

"Ruby, look at me."

A little while ago he'd had a hard time getting her to stop staring (and poking) at the novelty of his opaque visage. But now her gaze was fixated at the floor, hands clenched as she counted the scuffs on the tile like the inadequacies of her life. Naruto knew that look. Hence, he knew what to do. Striding forward, he took her slight frame in his hands and forced her to acknowledge him.

"Ruby, please look at me."

She did look at him, the blue eyes so clear and earnest she could see straight through to the future. Both qualities scared her, but it would do no good to pretend they weren't there. She could feel the weight of his hands on her shoulders like knighthood with the duty that befell both.

"Do you see me? I'm the same person I was before, the one you know. Can you still believe that? Do you still trust me?"

Confronted by this unfair question, Ruby bit her lip in a gesture that would normally be described as 'cute' or 'endearing' but for the seriousness of the implication, along with the tiny bead of blood sneaking out of the corner of her mouth.

"-Gah! Now look what you've done." Solemnity postponed for this seeming triviality, Naruto took his duty just as seriously as he tore another piece from his tattered Sage's cloak to dab away the ruby-red rivulet. "You did that on purpose, didn't you?"

"No I- hey! Quit it! I'm perfectly fine taking care of myself!"

"I _know_ , I'm just trying to help- stop moving around Ruby or I'll-"

With this spat drawing more attention than the previous quarrel, Blake used the distraction to further her own opinion. Quietly, and to one she knew would listen.

"You're not going to try and mother me too, are you?" Shikamaru spoke to the shadow through a cigarette hanging in the corner of his mouth. Unlit.

"Only if you try and smoke that in here."

"Wouldn't dream of it." Though he had, in fact, been weighing the odds of success. Seeing he wasn't going to get such a chance, he carefully hid it back into a pocket. "Happy now?"

Her silence was telling. But when she deigned to answer, it was with more sobriety than sarcasm.

"What happened to: not turning your back on your friends?"

"Tch." Shikamaru shoved his hands in his pockets and cursed his lack of nicotine. "I thought you said you weren't going to nag me?"

"I said that I won't be your mother."

Glancing sideways at the shady lady, Shikamaru saw her silently eying him the same way and swore again under his breath. Prior experience with the more 'troublesome' sex had taught him to expect at least a glower, perhaps a slap or two. He was hesitant to say which was more of a drag to deal with.

"Mendokusai…" Starting with a petulant slouch and a grumble, he straightened into the other personality which inhabited his body. The one his real mother had drilled into him a long time ago. "We're not asking you to give up on us. Just the opposite."

Slowly surveying the plebian scene, Shikamaru drunk in the venerable castle walls which had withheld the siege of Grimm, the students rushing hither-tither around their group while pushing double-duty, as well as the epicenter of their little gathering which had once again broken down into Naruto and Ruby snipping at one another like children… or an old married couple. The two were surprisingly similar.

"If we're up against who we think we are, Naruto's the only one who stands a real chance of victory. Even if we're wrong and it turns out to be Ozpin's Salem, that's hardly better 'cause it means she is even stronger than we gave her credit for." Now that he finally had hair again, Shikamaru lamented that he could actively feel it turning gray. " _Whoever's_ pulling the strings, I can hardly see them sitting idle while we pick ourselves off the ground."

"So, you think that there's going to be another assault against Vale?"

"Unlikely. Vale's guard is up now, and there aren't anywhere near enough local forces to do serious damage. Besides, this attack had all the hallmarks of a long-con which had something go drastically wrong. The person with enough patience to set it up wouldn't have limited themselves to just _one_ plan."

"Then I guess the real question is: who's next?"

Turning his head fully towards the woman for the first time, she realized he was acknowledging her.

"I see." With arms still folded, she once again let her gaze wander to their supposed 'secret-weapon' who was cowering under the beratement of her own team leader. "We'll be covering your backs."

"If that's the way you want to think of it." Shikamaru shrugged, but it was obvious by now to Blake that's what he wanted her to think.

"It's better than any alternative, isn't it?" She asked, eyes still focused on the blond who had become a central figure in their lives without them really knowing anything about him. "That you just want to keep us busy. Either because we'll get in the way," **Now** she stared pointedly at him with a stare that jumped out of his parent's grave. "Or because there isn't any hope to begin with."

Blake's turn to be surprised as Shikamaru scoffed, seemingly making light of her concern.

"I suppose you'll learn this sooner rather than later," Further rebuffing her with the cigarette returned to his mouth, Shikamaru at the very least had sense enough to start making his way outside and away from the growing quagmire. "Despite being a knucklehead, there's a reason we follow him. Whenever _**that**_ guy's involved, there's always hope. He can wring blood from a stone and transmute defeat into victory."

Watching the lackadaisical genius walk off to satisfy his nicotine addiction, Blake was less than assured. She believed him, because in the past, Shikamaru had made sense. But this was beyond such things as sense and reason, belonging to a subject that lay outside of both their specialties.

When logic turned its back on her, Blake turned her attention to the ones she currently trusted. And found herself wondering why, as her captain was physically restrained by her sister and Blake's partner while Weiss stood by, shaking her head in dismay and just how far things had degenerated. On the opposite side was Jiraiya who was stymieing his student with one hand and Shino who stood by the heiress in what could have been silent commiseration- who really knew with that guy?

These were the people she was supposed to put her faith in?

She found the corners of her mouth twitching upwards. A smile.

Why not? Between the eight of them, maybe this time they could get it right.

* * *

"So… this is the way things are now,"

Tentative finality, awaiting a response. But there was to be none other than his own voice echoing around the cavernous room. The one who held his focus was as unresponsive as ever, ageless and undying within her glass chrysalis.

"Why, then, does it feel like nothing has changed?"

Not only the amber-haired woman in her crystal coffin, but the status quo of their broken world. What meager gains they had made against the Grimm could be measured in inches while the death toll was an ever-growing statistic. What had this latest episode cost them?

"Perhaps that is because we tend to remember things the way we want to." A voice older and even more wizened than his own offered a suggestion. "The past skews our vision of the present."

"Ms. Koharu," Ozpin turned from the machine keeping his Fall Maiden alive- Though alive was subjective, as this undead woman in front of him proved. "It is good to see you. Forgive me for being so forward, but you look a good deal more youthful than I had been led to believe."

"Oh?" An ageless mirth quirked a smile on a visage that was not more than fifty. "I suppose 'retirement' has done me well, then. Whereas I was staring in the mirror this morning and wondering who this old woman was."

Neither bothered to chuckle at this hollow exchange, and the beyond-ancient being came to stand by the headmaster who was yet but a babe in comparison. She too looked at the waxen-faced youth in the pod, but with a gaze that was as apathetic as the lifeless body demanded.

"One minute I was dancing in the limitless electronic world, and then when I awoke from the dream, I was stuck in this plodding vessel. No… I have a feeling that I have always been old, even when I was young. Always serious, thinking too far into the future. This never made me a terribly adept kunoichi, but it assured that I would have a future after I was done." Staring no more at the object behind the glass but the face reflected in it. Running a hand over the newborn flesh, noticing there were fewer wrinkles than she remembered. Then again, that could just be her imagination. "Now, possibly because of this, I am the only one left. Homura, Hiruzen- even that old bastard Danzo are gone from this world. And I am expected to be the keeper of their memory? Hmph. An impossible task."

Despite all her depreciation, those shrewd eyes which turned to him had lost none of their sharpness.

"I will always remember the best- and the worst- parts of them."

"Then it's a damn good thing you're not the only one left, you old bat."

"… That is why it is a good thing that there are others," Turning to said others, she greeted the motely group with a nod. "To keep us honest. Hello, Jiraiya-chan."

Taking advantage of his ability to frown, the Toad-Senin added an extra-harsh clack to his geta as he strutted up to the two. But he became more subdued and respectful as he neared the machine.

"So… nothing, huh?"

"Across the board, no change." Divorced from his own feelings in the matter, there was still a frown when Ozpin reported this. "If Shikamaru and Shino's report is accurate and the usurper is dead, it might signal an unintended split in the Maiden's power. I have no idea how the balance of the world will be affected by this."

"Yeah, well, we do have bigger, more immediate problems."

"Salem hasn't moved yet, but I am checking in with the other Kingdoms and preparing my own expeditionary forces in case."

"That's good, but that's not what I was referring to."

Guarded behind his back, Ozpin clenched his hands. He was not foolish enough to think that he could hide this tension from his 'advisors'- guests, elders- he didn't know what to call them anymore. No, there was a lot he did not know despite age and wisdom, but he felt that something more was about to be revealed to him.

"It's the Grimm."

"What about them?" Wandering up to their leader, Qrow and Glynda too were curious. Nothing had been revealed to them on their long trip down the shaft with the shinobi.

"It's time you learned how they are created."

Ozpin did not disguise the betrayal he felt, the contempt he had been coveting ever since he stumbled upon the secret to Dust- one of the greatest secrets of their existence. Although, he would have been a fool to assume it was the only one.

"So, you knew."

"Of course we did." Jiraiya scoffed in the face of the 'youngling's' anger. "What, did you think they simply popped out of nowhere, came from the sky like a falling star? You knew we knew, but your hatred of them exceeded any reservation held at this fact. The secret is on us, and I'll even take 100% of the blame. But its acceptance is on _**you**_."

"Enough!"

Heads were turned, and it wasn't solely for the volume which sent the stalactites shaking. No one had ever seen Glynda so visibly affected before, and few knew what to do. One who did, happened to be standing right next to her, and Koharu laid a calm, matronly hand on her shoulder.

"… Why now? What has happened that we need to know?"

Koharu nodded for her kohai to continue, and Jiraiya purged his prior petulance with a similar gesture.

"The Grimm are us."

Breaking the silence made the gathered realize there was a silence in the first place, the blond young man having not uttered a word in some time. Almost as unusual for Goodwitch to lose her cool was for Naruto to lose his voice. Since he had been freed from confinement, he had been expending a seemingly endless wellspring of energy in every direction. From clones that took the brunt of Vale's recovery to his chatter which emulated the boy he had been a very, very long time ago.

"The Grimm are us. The ones who… didn't make it."

"You mean," Properly cowed and calmed by the successive outbursts, Ozpin began to connect the breadcrumbs he'd been gathering without knowing what they were. "For every Dust that lost it's sense of self- of humanity…"

"A Grimm was born." More detached than the others by far- seemingly, anyways- Shikamaru stepped in. "This is mostly just speculation based on observations, but that's science." Although, he did find an intense need for tobacco, and glanced around to see if anyone was going to oppose him before he lit up and took a calming drag.

"Dust was Physical Chakra containing the Spiritual. Containing, but not maintaining. That was up to us as individuals. Technically, in that form, we might have been considered 'alive' if we conserved that idea of who we were. But say, the shell gets broken, spiritual Chakra gets released and we're on our way to the pure lands. No big deal." It was the fact that he was talking about the death of millions so calmly that had everyone on edge, waiting for what followed his next casual inhale. "-But if the Spirit is no longer human, where does it go? It'll just wander the globe like a beast, looking for the thing it once was."

"Then, every time we used Dust…" Ozpin didn't even have the strength to finish his thought as the implications tore up the very root of every conception he held, and he fell to his knees. "All along, we were the cause of the Grimm…"

"-And yeah, we knew." Finishing his thought along with his cigarette, Shikamaru tossed the burnt-out butt into the bottomless pit from whence they had all come. "Although, not right away. And even once I figured it out, what would it have mattered?"

"What would it have-?!"

"Who would have believed you?" Shikamaru glared down at the oldest living being besides themselves, chagrinned that he had to explain something so obvious. "By the time we figured it out, your entire society was based around that 'resource'. Ya think they would have just upped and quit when you told them? Addiction doesn't work like that. Hell, even if they'd find out that they were inadvertently killing the world, the ones getting rich and powerful wouldn't have stopped it. And if you'd fought against them, you would have lost even the few who might have believed you after mentioning 'talking Dust'."

"And the reason we didn't tell you," Though he was pained to do so, Jiraiya felt it was his moral obligation to voice this next part. "Is because we didn't want you to hold any reservations from killing every last one of those monsters. No matter who- _what_ they _used_ to be."

"-But we were _killing_ ourselves!" No longer inescapably chained to his knees by this invisible fate, Ozpin was suddenly on his feet and in Jiraiya's face. "You let us- you let _**me**_ send hundreds of young men and women to their deaths without knowing! For years- centuries, I though we'd had no hope, that the Grimm were an infinite plague upon this world, and you…"

"Would it have been better if they did know?" Staring levelly at the man who had him by the neck and ready to tear his throat out, Jiraiya did not so much as blink. It would have at least been appropriate from this man who was perhaps his counterpart in this age. "You think they would have died happier with guilt and hope opposed to just the one?"

It was a long time in which the only thing for any of them was Ozpin, the immutable man roused to action and then halted again. Panting like a beast, he slowly becalmed and his flushed complexion receded to a gray pallor the same shade as his hair or the walls of the cave.

"…No," He allowed tentatively, lowering the substantially larger man to the ground. "I suppose not."

"But, Ozpin-!" Glynda's meager indignation was stifled by the headmaster's now weary hand.

"… You were mentioning something else… what happens now."

"That," Combining a sigh of relief, exasperation, and release of a breath he didn't realize he was holding, Shikamaru mentally prepared himself for another disappointment. "We're not _**entirely**_ sure about."

"Give me what you have." Perhaps he was not on the moral high ground enough to demand this, considering what things _he'd_ kept from them; but Ozpin wasn't taking no for an answer this time.

"We assume the Gedō Mazō was being used as a vessel for our souls. How, quite what for, and who exactly sealed them in there I can only speculate as everything during that final battel is a bit sketchy for all of us." Knowing of some more so than others, Shikamaru glanced back at a pensive Naruto who was not so much listening to the conversation as staring at the floor and all the way down. "Undeniably, its destruction returned us our lives- or something indistinguishable from what they were. The problem is, it did so for _**everyone**_ , even those who didn't have a personage to return to."

Those few who had been aware when the phenomenon passed over them on its global diaspora now thought of the beautiful event in a different light. Each of those colored streamers journeying the stratosphere had been a freed soul, many who would continue to circumscribe Remnant looking for their missing piece, much like the Grimm.

"Ah jeez," This contemplation wreaking havoc on his buzz, Qrow palmed his forehead as he felt a pre-hangover coming on. "So, what, like opposite Grimm? What'll those things be like to deal with?"

"Dunno." Shikamaru shrugged, back to his usual indifference. "We won't know until- _if_ we encounter them. Could be they all just find their way to the afterlife, maybe linger here for a bit as intangible wraiths."

"Or perhaps they come to inhabit the body of Grimm as their own, transforming it into something worse. A creature with intentions more focused and fouler than wanton destruction." Another newcomer to the conversation, they all stared at Shino and his surprisingly dour prediction. "…Why do I mention this? You were all thinking it, and I was simply the only one willing."

"So," Recomposing herself masterfully after their brief emotional binge, Glynda glanced at her contemplative headmaster. "How does this affect the mission tomorrow?"

"I don't think it does." Reasoned though this response was, Glynda noted how it lacked Ozpin's normal sly assurance as the man seemed drained of everything. "It does, however, make me think we should move up our time schedule on the others. How many of the teams do you think can be ready to disembark tomorrow?"

Taken aback by the sudden urgency of this alteration, Glynda momentarily faltered in her ability to withdraw the requested information.

"Uh, I believe that we can spare 100% of the third-years remaining, twelve teams. 60% of the second-years, so, five teams. Then there's teams RWBY and JNPR…"

"Four, dear."

"What?" That was when Glynda remembered that Koharu had not left her shoulder through the ordeal.

"Four second-year teams, Ms. Goodwitch. Yatsuhashi Daiichi sustained the broken arm trying to lift a Goliath off his teammate, and poor Ms. Scarlatina will still need a few more days recovery from the bruising."

Everyone was impressed and astounded by this detailed knowledge, but none more so than Glynda.

"R-right."

"Do not worry, Glynda," Koharu gave the rattled woman another pat. "I believe everything will be taken care of in your absence. Take it from me, a vacation can do you wonders."

"It's hardly like we're gong on a pleasure cruise." Jiraiya fell back into his banter with folded arms. "Or have you finally gone senile with an actual brain to rot?"

"That reminds me: I've made sure that there will be no liquor on the transport and arranged for the pitstops to be in depopulated areas." The not-so-old old woman smiled sweetly with every year of her brewing treachery etched into her lips. "Best for security sake to resupply and refuel at small stations. Plus, it wouldn't do for Master Jiraiya to get distracted by the allure of Remnant's brothels on the way."

"You… witch! That's it! I'm staying here! This shrew is ten times worse than Salem could ever be!"

"Hmph. Again, makes me glad I'm not tagging along on this little suicide mission." Qrow muttered, taking a sympathetic swig as he crossed himself at the implied promise of abstinence.

"Just be sure you don't forget the other part to your mission." With one jaded eye cast over his shoulder, Ozpin watched his subordinate in his ablutions.

"Right, right," Not daring at the moment to wave him off, Qrow nodded sharply towards his superior. "I'll make sure the little tyke doesn't go anywhere near their expedition- or near the blond one, especially."

Ozpin nodded absently, but his mind was already returned to that woman frozen in time.

"I can no longer awaken it, but at the very least, I can make sure that hope does not perish."

But, was that really the best he could do?

* * *

With sweat cascading off his brow and slickening his grip of the wheelbarrow's handle, Jaune struggled to push his overburden forward along the uneven terrane. Down into a rut went the wheel and back up at a canted angle, tipping the balance of his whole load.

"No, no, no, no, no!"

With more effort than he'd expended thus far on his trek back and forth, he managed to right the stack of bricks before it toppled and spilled all over Beacon's beleaguered lawn. Successfully dropping the cart onto its back legs, he was unsure if he'd be able to pick it back again as he dropped next to it.

Hanging onto the weathered wooden handles and in the refreshing shade of his towering load, Jaune tried to wipe his brow and congratulate his near miss. But he couldn't help but wonder,

Was this really the best he could do?

" 'Scuse me! Coming through!"

Though Jaune didn't actually have to move, he craned his sore neck just in time to see a flash of gold pass him by with a burden that dwarfed them both.

The sight was a familiar one, a similar character greeting him every morning in the mirror with blond hair and smile equally forced.

But this wasn't him.

"Woah! Hey there, sorry 'bout that!" Coming back- or was it another one stumbling on his carcass? Jaune could hardly tell, and to his knowledge, no one could. "I- er, _He_ gets kind of single-minded when it comes to this sort of thing. Need a hand?"

Staring at his own calluses and not the offered palm, Jaune shook his head despondently.

"Ah… okay then. Just be sure not to push yourself, there's no real rush on the work, ~dattebayo." If he understood the animosity directed towards him, the carbon copy didn't show that he noticed as he went on carrying his own staggeringly heavy load. "Good idea, taking a break in the shade. Just make sure you get some water, okay? I'd suck having you pass out on us. Yosh! Ikuzo!"

And with that, the other blond mercifully departed, and Jaune was left alone in his stew, staring at his tattered jeans and wiry muscles.

It just wasn't fair.

"Jaune?" Life wasn't. If it had even the least bit of sympathy for him, it wouldn't let his redhaired teammate find him under the pile of bricks. "There you are." Pyrrha's perpetually cheery face was highlighted by the sun- a good look for her. If only he too could grow under its nourishment.

"You've been working hard from what I hear. It's gotten so that we almost don't see you in the dorm except to sleep." If Jaune didn't know better, he'd say that sunstroke had twisted her smile somewhat into something sinister. "It's almost like you're trying to avoid us, your team… again."

Gulping, Jaune found that he really was dehydrated.

"Tha-that's not it."

"Good." Moving over to the protruding wheelbarrow handle, she sat down on it as the massive load was more than enough to counter her weight. "Then do you want to tell me what it is, or should I tell you what I think?"

Avoiding her gaze which might pry out the truth before he was ready, Jaune thought on what the crux of his issue really was…

* * *

" _ **You think too much, kid."**_

 _No longer, he charged with_ Crocea Mors _howling through the air in a blow that would have felled any man. But Arslan was no man- nor woman, nor really even Faunus or Human. For no matter how many times he or anyone else cut her down, she would rise again from the ashes like a bad idea._

 _-But he would still try. He had to. There was no other option but to keep hacking away at her immortal body until it finally gave, or he did. Jaune huffed a shout that was more beast than man- but alive! The one thing for certain he could say he possessed in this world. Not brains, not brawn, not pride or dignity, but that rising pulse and the minute spark that gave life to intention._

 _He thrust, fully prepared for his telegraphed move to be deflected, after which he would-_

 _Grabbing his thoughts and his blade, the stony-eyed woman wrenched them both away as she stabbed the length through her jaw and into her skull._

" _W-w-wha…?"_

 _His hands were still on the hilt, but Jaune's mind was bugging out with his eyes._

 _She laughed- actually giggled, if it were to be believed. If he weren't already so bemused, he would have wondered how this was possible._

" _ **You should… see your face**_ _." Her own smirked, mouth parted to see the tapered edge sticking up through the roof of her mouth. He watched as the malignancy drained from her eyes and was replaced by a lament, shimmering and cold like an Autumn breeze across a pond. "_ _ **Told you**_ _… Kid," Then she looked at him with those eyes that were once again only human- blood as black as any Grimm flowed over his hands but he could not feel its icy bite._

" _Don't think about it."_

 _Arslan's body melted, ink bleeding from a paper tag. That was the only thing left when the rest of her disappeared. The seal marker fluttered, skewered on his sword as a white flag of surrender._

* * *

Under the blistering sun Jaune shivered, wondering how he could heed her final request. Or was it advice? An order? She was right; he thought too much, always trying to think of where he fit into that memory, other than an irrelevant observer.

"Why?"

"Hm?" Allowing him his moment of introspection, Pyrrha perked up as he stirred.

"What's the point?" He looked at her from his place on the ground. "Why do you keep trying to help me out? Why do **I** tire myself with this work when it'll get done anyway? Why do I want to fight when nothing I do has an effect on the outcome? What's the point if in the end I'm just a nobody, a filler for people like you- people like _Him_."

Jaune gestured halfheartedly as another clone of Naruto jogged by while porting a stack of bricks as large as the one Jaune had tried to wheel into place.

"Hm." Looking from blond to blond, Pyrrha watched Naruto as if she'd never seen him before. "He is impressive. From what little I've seen, they're all strong fighters as well." Lolling her head back to her partner, she asked, "So what makes you think I can even compare to them?"

"What?" Almost standing at this blasphemy, Jaune settled for an offended expression. "You're- well, you're **you**. Pyrrha Nikos, the- well, ya know…"

"I do. And I'm also aware how meaningless such titles are in the real world." Jaune quieted down when the beratement was redirected back to him, but Pyrrha had her own self-scrutiny to trudge through. "A few days before all this happened, Ozpin came to me."

Detachment became a frown as she continued to watch the blond legion work while not really watching anything in particular.

"He… gave me a choice. One which he claimed would effect not just my team and even Beacon, but Vale and possibly all of Remnant as well."

"What… what did he ask you to do?" Curious despite his prior disillusionment, Jaune leaned forward for an answer.

"Something which would require great sacrifice on my part." Her face showed none of the strain of the decision, as if it could no longer even contemplate it. "It would give me power, enough that I would be able to protect everyone from a disaster like this."

"And, what did you do?" Jaune hardly felt worthy of asking this question, as he realized his own motives for strength weren't nearly so altruistic.

"Nothing."

"Nothing?"

Pyrrha shook her head. "No. By the time I made up my mind, we were already in the middle of the fight and I couldn't find the headmaster." She smiled, but it was one Jaune had never seen before. Sad, and with a bitter irony. "I sought him out afterwards. I guess that was yesterday. But I found him and told him I was ready. I told him that I would never let anything like this happen again, even if it…" She shook her head, perishing the thought. "I realized I would give up everything for my friends."

"You said, you _were_ ready, that you realized. Pyrrha… what happened?"

She watched disinterestedly as a group of Naruto clones nearly lost control over a piece of a cupula shaped like a slice of an orange. But then the gaggle just spawned more copies who wrenched the copper sheet under control.

"He told me that I didn't need to anymore."

A few Naruto clones had been crushed into puffs of smoke under the immense weight, but together like ants they walked the thing towards where cranes would take it to its resting place. Or, perhaps the blond would manhandle it into place himself. She was willing to believe just about any feat at this point.

"In the end… my choice didn't matter. And I guess I realize that it never mattered. And yet, compared to the rest of my life, in which every decision was already predetermined," Turning back towards her bewildered captain, her smile blossomed back into its usual radiance. "I think I prefer my little freedom. It might not matter to the rest of the world, but our choices are far from meaningless."

Jaune once again fell into a silent contemplation over her words. No matter how often he seemed to do this, it never got any easier for him. Face twisted in pain of thought- think, don't think- trying to parse out the right conclusion to make of this, realizing it might not matter at all to anyone but himself.

"Why do you think he does so much?"

"Eh?"

Jerking a shoulder to the bustling blond, they now noticed other students filling in here and there. A few daring to berate a doppelgänger on how to properly lay a brick or fit a replacement glass fragment into its mosaic.

"I… dunno…"

"I think it's because he's afraid," Remarking in sympathy," He's afraid that no matter how much he does, how strong he becomes, that what he's doing won't be enough."

Jaune failed to see this resemblance. But he knew he missed a lot of things.

"During the battle, I saw him dismiss an Apex Gryphon like it was just a pigeon." She shook her head as if to deny this truth she witnessed with her own eyes. "Such strength… and yet, there are so few of their kind left. All that power and yet he couldn't hold on to his friends. Knowing that there are those kinds of insurmountable odds out there waiting for us, it should make me want to give up, shouldn't it?"

Though he could apply this logic to himself, for Pyrrha it seemed so sickeningly wrong. As if someone had suddenly told him that night was day, Grimm were good, and the only way to escape was to give up on every liberty.

"But, I can't." She suddenly stood, strode forward a few paces and turned to Jaune. "It's foolish, but I have to believe that every little bit counts. Every spar, every battle makes me better at protecting my friends, my team, myself, my own life for just a few seconds longer. It's clear that none of us can do it alone. But taken together, perhaps our individual contributions still matter?"

She was reaching, lending him a hand to pull himself up.

But it wasn't just for him. It was for her as well. His existence validated others, even if he hadn't yet figured out how to do it for himself.

Jaune lifted himself out of the shade of the stones, hand firmly clasped around that living thing called truth.

* * *

Unpleasant truth, frustration, anger, resignation… acceptance. These things came as fits and spurts into his mind as individual clones dispelled themselves all around campus, disseminating their knowledge to the remaining collective.

Naruto smirked as he set a strut in position across from another clone, holding it still while one of the students with a rivet gun fastened it into place. Standing up from his crouch, he went to wipe off the iron-oxide dust which had stuck to his hands. But instead, he stopped and simply stared at the rust-red grit already ground into his palms which had been baby-pink this morning.

"You want this?" He spoke to the calluses and scars, that annoying lifeline which never seemed to run out. "You can have it."

"Naruto-san,"

Without further ado, he wiped his hands mostly clean of the tenacious stain and turned to find one Lie Ren addressing him. It went without saying that pink and orange followed him like a shadow. An energetic, nostalgic shadow that reminded Naruto perhaps too much of his long-gone teammates- himself included.

"Mr. Ren," He chortled as the boy flinched and presented a toothy grin that was almost as mischievous as the one fixed on Nora's face. "See? Doesn't feel right, does it? I told you to just call me Naruto."

"Very well," The dark-haired teen who reminded Naruto of the third in their trio chuckled politely behind his hand while restraining his partner from getting in the way of people with heavy machinery. "Naruto, you wouldn't have happened to see Pyrrha- or our captain, would you?"

Catching the despondency with which the second name was tagged in, Naruto felt himself smirk lopsided, which was balanced by a thumb jerked over his right shoulder.

"You'll find _them_ just over there."

Subtlety was not lost on the tall boy who paused only briefly before giving Naruto a shallow nod and almost invisible smile.

"Thank you. Come on, Nora."

"K! Bye Whiskers! Keep up the good work!"

His parting wave was quick, as was his furtive glance and the thought to send a clone after them to make sure everything would work out. The idea was struck down quickly, vanished like the other clone he'd kept in the wings, just in case Jaune was even more of a stubborn ass than usual.

No, he'd let them figure this out on their own. The only thing he should do was give them the time for it, making sure that neither Glynda nor anyone else disturbed them. JNPR's 'urgent' mission could wait until they'd had their moment as a team.

Something he wished he could have had.

His hand grasped at his torso, torn between chest and stomach. One completely empty, the other only feeling like it had a hole bored in it still.

"Although, I suppose I'll be seeing you soon, Sasuke."

* * *

Alone, staring at the stars whose light like the souls long gone winked at him from far away.

Would his precious people even remember him when he finally rejoined them? _If_ he did? Maybe it was just wishful thinking, and time had actually stopped long before.

An endless night full of stars which would no longer change, wouldn't disappear on him if he should blink or fall asleep. There was a whole sky full of new constellations that he had to memorize now, their light arriving from somewhere in the past. Possibly even carrying reflections of his friends with them. That wouldn't be such a bad way to spend an eternity, would it?

But the moon would forever be broken, with nothing he could do to fix it.

"Hey," Naruto called, not bothering to move a muscle other than his mouth. "You finally made it."

He could feel Ruby's incensed blush radiate like the sun from behind him, the brightest star in his estimation.

"You make it sound like I was actually _looking_ for you." She huffed and folded her arms. "I'll remind you that I **do** come up here… on occasion."

"I know," His smile was small, but it was all he could manage. It was heavy, because it was genuine. "Just though it was better than running around the whole campus."

He patted the space next to him, his once proud Sage cloak relegated to a moth-eaten blanket.

Her small hesitation was an eternity, and even when she lay next to him, she was still so far away. Closer than friends, within arm's reach and yet seemingly as far apart as the vast blackness.

"So… what're _**you**_ doing up here?" She began by twiddling her thumbs, not content to just lay but afraid to do anything else. "Aren't you tired after all that work today?"

"Maybe," He admitted, "But I can't really sleep. So, I figured that I'd lay up here and enjoy the stars." She glanced over to check on his seriousness, but saw instead the dark bags circling his eyes. "Figured someone might wander up and talk to me."

His hand rested next to hers. It wouldn't take much effort at all, a wiggle of a finger for their bodies to touch and yet she hesitated. It was different than before, wasn't it?

"They're different." Could he still read her thoughts? Even if he couldn't, the palpable stiffening of her body was enough for him to speak again. "The stars, I mean."

"How so?" She struggled and squinted, looking for any variances that might jump out to her untrained eyes.

"It's my first time really looking at them since…"

He trailed off, unable to articulate that previous life whose details had all but vanished with only broken remnants remaining. Ruby noticed the lack of continuation and the prolonged silence, glancing over at him again.

"Naruto? Are you alright?"

She knew he wasn't, but these were the words which connected them now in place of that chain-link necklace.

She could see the reflection of his white teeth as he smiled, and anticipated him brushing her off.

"No, I really don't think I am."

There had been guilt frozen in the walls of his prison, and he was only now realizing it. With life returned self-loathing, anger that he had survived while others had not.

"You should really rest," Ruby admonished, already knowing that it wouldn't do any good unless she somehow knocked him unconscious. If only she were strong enough! "You're trying to take on too much! We've been alright without you guys for forever- well, maybe not _forever_ , but for a really long time. We can take care of ourselves. Remnant won't fall apart in just a few days!"

It was the argument they'd had earlier, but now she was beginning to doubt. Fear was associated with Naruto declaring himself incapable.

"I know," He admitted, calming her somewhat. "And I'm sorry, but I can't."

"Can't what?"

"Can't just leave it alone. Can't rest- can't even sleep."

"You can't sleep? Like, not at all?" He shook his head more in disbelief than denial. "Is this something new? Do any of the others have this? You were able to sleep before, right? When you were in the Dust."

"It wasn't the same," He explained, "Wasn't ever truly unconscious, just… resting. And now, it's not that I physically can't- at least, I don't think so. Rather, I'm too afraid to."

Abruptly he turned to her, and it was his distraught eyes which startled her more than the action.

"I'm worried that if- if I fall asleep, the next time I wake up everything will be different again. I blink and it'll all be gone- you, Shikamaru, Shino, Ero-Senin, Yang and the others- I'm scared that if I even stop for a minute, I'll be left behind. I'll fail again like-"

"Shh." Without knowing how else to cope, Ruby shushed him like Yang sometimes did for her with a hand firmly over his roughshod mouth (an action which also had absolutely nothing to do with the earlier argument). "Sorry. I get it but, that's not how this works."

With that infinitesimal distance already breached, she removed her hand to poke him firmly in the forehead which was reassuringly solid under her touch.

"The ones you knew, they're not up **there**. They're in here."

"Ow," He uttered halfheartedly, only now noticing the absence of his once-proud forehead protector as he distractedly ran a hand over the spot she poked him. That thought and his hand were taken by Ruby not a moment later.

"-And I'll always be here, too," giving a squeeze as she lay back down, afraid to show her luminescent blush. "That promise works both ways."

He remembered, it hadn't been that long ago. And with the knowledge firmly in hand, he reclined somewhat contentedly against the last vestiges of the past.

They both lay there with so much on their mind it felt like nothing at all, a snowstorm where nothing was clear but that one physical connection.

"I'm sorry, Ruby,"

"Huh?"

"I'm sorry. I've been nothing but selfish. I'm supposed to be helping you, but at the same time, I don't want anything to change. I want to protect you and this world like I couldn't do for my own. But I guess it's not up to me, ~ttebayo?" He chuckled at the return of his verbal tick, a nagging reminder that the past wouldn't die even if he wanted it to. "Can't keep you behind glass, can I?"

"W-well…" Another squeeze, reassuring, redoubling, reinforcing, "It's alright if you protect me a _little bit_ , I guess."

With this permission they both relaxed into the tenderized cloak beneath and the darkness above. The clock's hour-hand was cresting its apex and the day's turbulence rapidly receding into yesterday. Before she knew it, Ruby was falling herself, away into a deep sleep.

Something let go and it felt like she truly was in freefall, stirring as Naruto let go of her hand.

"-aruto?" She moaned unconsciously when that pressure left her, only to experience another, much more substantial presence come to rest along her bosom. "H-hey, what a-are you doing?!"

She was now awake enough to catch the sleepy mumble coming from the blond lump and reverberating in her chest.

"…c'n hear… heartbeat…"

She was certain that he could, with the fist-sized organ trying to pummel its way into his skull. But if that's what he needed to be assured of her presence… at least she was warm enough now, the balmy night being supplemented by her flush.

"Dummy,"

She probably could have wiggled her way out, but didn't. Or, only enough to shift her cloak haphazardly over the two of them and settle back in.

She had promised to be there, after all.

* * *

 **Embedded lyrics: Black Friday Rule by Flogging Molly**


	20. Holocene

**So, here we are again. Feels just like the last, right? And every time that came before it. I apologize for being late, disclaimers, yada, yada...**

 **But... there are currently some new things in the works. So maybe a little quid pro quo? I give you a little something, you leave me a little something, *hint, hint*.**

 **In any case, even if you don't, congrats on making it this far. I thank you from the bottom of my heart (took a little while to find all the way down there).**

* * *

Jiraiya was prepared for a great many things beginning on the day that he died, up to and including the end of everything. There was no reason for him to expect a cushy afterlife (even if he believed in such a thing). In his own words, he'd been a slave to the three cardinal sins set out for Shinobi of alcohol, gambling and women. But he'd also had the dubious honor of seeing the **true** horrors of the world while he was alive and was therefore prepared to accept whatever fate awaited him, however horrid.

He wasn't prepared for what really happened. Many more questions than answers awaited him in that limbo, and he'd been given nothing but time to think about them. For all it was worth, his sentence was cut short and he was no closer to answering most. And as it turned out, during his absence from the world, more questions had grown along with a new breed of humanity.

Case in point:

"What did I do wrong?"

Yang neither knew the man's history nor cared about it. She also wasn't intimidated by his gargantuan stature, having confronted the infamous information broker Hei "Junior" Xiong and emasculated him (literally) in front of his entire club and crew.

Jiraiya gulped without knowing quite why he was so wary of this teen who he could (and had) carried with one hand. Only that he knew the look she was giving him. It was in the language universal to every female species which let the less-adroit males know when they had seriously fucked up and had to run.

Sadly, there was nowhere to go in that sealed craft except the emergency exits, and the Atlesian frigate had already reached cruising altitude. Although, perhaps if he-

"Itai, itai, itai, itai! That hurts!" Though he knew he should be grateful the blonde boxer only had a stranglehold on his earlobe, Jiraiya couldn't help the spineless pleading. "Seriously girl, I swear, whatever it is I had nothing-"

"Shh!"

He was silenced well enough by Yang's other hand clamping just as rudely over his mouth. Yanking the larger man down to her level, they cautiously approached the cargo hold and leered together around the corner.

"Tell me you didn't have anything to do with-" Hissing, she jabbed a finger into the room, "That!"

Jiraiya wasn't quite sure what he should find so interesting and blinked, only seeing the familiar profile of his blond apprentice and the increasingly recognizable red lump which constituted Yang's sister by his side.

"What?"

He was still confused, only knowing that he had obviously said something wrong when Yang pulled him back around the corner and dragged him down by two fistfuls of his kimono.

"What did you do?!" Any nostalgic comparison Jiraiya had drawn between Yang and his former teammate was consumed by the literal fire in the girl's eyes. "You. The self-proclaimed 'Super-Pervert' must have hand a hand in this. How did you put him up to this? Naruto might be considered old, but he's still just as naïve as Ruby. Did you trick him? A Bribe? Threat? You better choose one, because if turns out you corrupted my little sister, I'll-"

"Wait, wait, wait- just a minute here!" Seeing how quickly the senseless situation was spiraling out of control, Jiraiya broke himself out of the death grip and quickly put some distance between himself and the woman's righteous- if misdirected- fury. "I think there's been a terrible misunderstanding. I haven't had two words alone with the girl, to say nothing of my troublesome apprentice."

"Like I'd believe that," Yang stalked towards the man who was busy molding chakra for a very serious escape attempt.

"It's the truth!" Jiraiya protested, disguising his movements with frantic hand-waving, "Besides, I'm not really sure what I'm supposed to be culpable of here. I thought you were perfectly happy with the brat and your sister. Something about their mutual ignorance being… cute…" Though Jiraiya had his own opinions. _Icha Icha_ hadn't had a new title in nigh on a decade, and he was looking for _inspiration_.

"That's _exactly_ the problem!" Dramatic tears had suddenly welled up, dousing the smoldering fury. "My baby sis's innocence is- is-"

"What?" Suddenly knowing exactly what the matter was, Jiraiya only really had one question to ask, "Are you sure?"

"Just _look_ at them!"

So, he did. Stealthily moving around the corner bulkhead, he observed the pair with all the scrutiny of a sniper casing their target. For a good thirty seconds he was all business, observing his student and his partner while looking to define the extent of this partnership.

"Nope."

"Huh?"

"Just what I said," Jiraiya was back in front of Yang, his turn to be reproving with arms crossed. "For what it's worth, your sister's 'virtue' is intact."

"That can't be. I mean, just _look_! They're practically glowing!"

"I did," He snorted, flaunting his authority on the matter he quipped, "Don't see it."

"How can you not-"

"Maybe you're seeing only the things you _want_ to see."

They were both surprised to find Blake standing just down the hallway, looking every bit uninterested in the argument she decided to weigh in on. After their gob-smacked silence had drifted into the minute mark, she looked over the rim of her book and shrugged.

"What? It's pretty clear that Yang's overreacting." "Overreac-?!" "It's an easy mistake to make if someone doesn't have experience."

Blake didn't think Yang's jaw could unhinge any further, until the insinuations finally sunk in, and it did.

Yang tried and failed several times to form a coherent rebuttal to what was clearly their most reserved teammate calling her out. At last, responding with:

"You know what?" The blonde centered herself with a calming breath. "This never happened."

Trying- and mostly failing- to maintain her composure and what little dignity remained, Yang strode mechanically past her partner and the equally stone-faced Jiraiya.

Only when she turned the corner did they both devolve into fits of laughter which wouldn't be silenced by the metal hull, but instead reverberated throughout the vessel taking them to Atlas. They didn't care, as it had been much needed. Their journey thus far had been a laborious struggle not to think about what awaited them upon disembarking.

"So," Collecting himself before his sides split and he could no longer drink to his heart's content, Jiraiya propositioned the quiet Faunus to whom he'd never been properly acquainted. "What brings you down here? From what I know, Shikamaru is in the tactical room and hasn't left since cast-off."

"Contrary to what you might think _Master_ Jiraiya, not all of us have to be joined at the hip." Blake drawled with no thrift of sarcasm. "I **had** wanted to find some peace and quiet, but I don't think I'll find that here. Good day."

Not taking offense at what was, by his standards a tame rebuff, Jiraiya shrugged.

"Have it your way. Chances are, you won't be getting much opportunity for relaxation _or_ privacy for that matter in the coming weeks. I'm sure neither of the two 'lovebirds' would notice someone else joining them in the background. I have a feeling though, that you're liable to enjoy the book's ending more than theirs."

Looking to amuse himself for the remainder of their journey, Jiraiya considered seeking out Yang to tease her more but was restrained by a question cast over his shoulder like a fishing hook.

"What do you mean by that?"

Hook line and sinker.

"Judging by how you want to find a nice and 'secluded' place to read, my guess is that you're getting to the juicy part which is near the end. Pity you didn't bring the sequel along; it'll be a long time until you're able to finish since those dunderheads in Atlas saw fit to ban the series."

" _What."_ His words were not unlike her own claws had they been dragged across the metal hull, and Blake clutched her frivolous reading material closer to her chest. "How do you know this?"

"My dear girl," Jiraiya tried to hide his smirk under pride as he turned to the apoplectic Blake. "I wrote them."

It was a ludicrous claim. But it also made only too much sense. It was the very kind of coincidence which had plagued them from cradle to grave and chased their life's journey, nipping at their heels out of the gates of hell. She had nothing to lose.

"…You wouldn't happen to have a… personal copy, would you?" The old letch's eyes scraped the low ceiling as he pretended to give thought to the question. "… **Master** Jiraiya?"

"Heh-heh, since you put it that way…"

Jiraiya already knew he was going to hell and that they might very well be rapidly approaching that destination.

But just because the world was going to end, didn't mean you couldn't have fun as it happened.

* * *

The end of fun and games came swifter than expected, before the pleasure could grow stale and before they even had a chance to accept it as something they deserved. They could no more change the course of their craft than they could change the trajectory the world seemed to be taking.

Atlas would be where it happened, right there amidst the snow and tarmac in black and white. The shinobi and team RWBY going their separate ways, only hoping that their paths would intersect again.

The temperate northern summer along with snowplows had cleared the airfield for their arrival. But the military frigate's jet engines revving idly blew cold over the group as they disembarked down the ramp and onto the asphalt.

To the left, another, smaller craft awaited to whisk the shinobi away towards the unexplored western continent where their ultimate enemy lurked. And straight ahead, defying the gusts buffeting her starched trench coat was-

"Weiss!"

Winter broke rank and surged forward towards the Beacon team who were surprised by the warm welcome among the cold. Before reaching them, the officer came to a skittering halt as she remembered her rank, duty and _her_ soldiers watching her conduct from the car.

-And promptly ignored it all.

"Eh, screw it."

No longer caring for such frivolities, the normally stern woman leapt forward to capture her sibling in a tight hug. Some things were more important than propriety. Like family, or a promise.

"It's good to see you, Little Sister."

"W-Winter- um, not that it's not good to see you too…" Struggling to get her words and arms free, Weiss felt the eyes of almost everyone in the three groups upon her and Winter.

More for her sister's sake than for that of those watching, Winter eventually let her down. Dropping the unbalanced girl, the elder sibling patted them both down, smoothing the wrinkles in their clothing if not their relationship as she resumed her stoic mien.

"It is good to see that you are all well. I hope that the trip was not too inconveniencing after… what happened," It was clear that Winter harbored some guilt and some resentment for not being there. "I am hoping that your stay here will not be as hectic. It will be good to catch up, and I look forward to meeting your team at long last."

Winter nodded to the three others who were feeling a bit adrift, lost at this fork in the road. Their captain herself was not so much looking forward to the mission Ozpin had assigned them, but askance, towards the shinobi who continued to linger within sight.

"I would hope so, but I doubt the headmaster would send us here if he didn't think something was up." Blake stepped forward, filling in for their distracted leader and the instable Weiss. She held out a hand to one of the only Schnee's she held no prior grudges against. "Blake. Blake Belladonna."

With only an eyebrow raised to show she knew the name, Winter took the proffered hand and shook it firmly.

"Yang Xiao-Long, at your service," Stepping into the vacant spot, Yang debated a casual greeting before mimicking Blake's gesture. "And the squirt here who's being unusually quiet is our team's captain and my baby sis. Come 'on Ruby, introduce yourself."

"Yeah, likewise…" Yang's interruption failed to prompt a proper greeting from the distracted girl.

It did, however, stir her towards a different action. "Sorry, but would you excuse me for just a sec-"

"Wait, Ruby, where are you- oh lord."

Despite her hasty exist, it wasn't that hard to find the red-clad girl again amidst the monochrome background. Also, they all had a pretty good idea where the trail of rose-petals led, leaving Yang in their wake to try and explain her sister's uncouth behavior to their newest handler.

"Heh, heh, sorry about that. It's- well, ya see…"

"Head's up."

"Huh?" Stopping in his tracks, Naruto looked over to where Shikamaru was standing with his back turned to him and the wind, trying to coax his lighter to life. "What's the-Ooomph!"

"I believe it would have been more helpful had you given Naruto-san more specific advice." Shino observed, stepping out of the way of the red and black projectile which knocked Naruto off his feet and into the snowbank.

"Whatever."

Finally succeeding in getting his cigarette to light, Shikamaru couldn't care less. So, he left the two where they lay while starting his internal clock. Not like they hadn't had enough time on the ship for goodbyes, but he'd give them five minutes more. Time enough to enjoy his smoke.

-If it weren't for Blake continuing to glare at him from across the tarmac.

"Troublesome."

Naruto had much the same thought during his brief journey through the air. Confusion had struck him first with surprising force, but he quickly recognized what was burrowing into his chest and knocking the wind out of him before they even impacted the soft bank.

After which, he need only figure out why he _still_ couldn't catch his breath- Why he couldn't see past the splayed black tresses, could taste nothing but the ripest strawberry, and couldn't even think of why he needed anything else to live, anyway.

Being that he didn't think, the first thing out of his mouth when Ruby herself broke for air was:

"Ow." He rubbed his tongue over the split lip acquired from the dangerously awkward kiss. With a wince, he noticed the instigator had her head twisted to the side in almost equal pain of mortification. "I mean, uh, wow?" Once language had returned to him, everything else did as well and he shot up with the girl firmly in his grasp. "No-wait-What?!-Why?!- Ruby, what the heck are you doing?!"

"Does it look like I know?!" It wasn't like she could help it, just like she couldn't help the tears welling up in her eyes which burned with the cold. Both actions hurt unconscionably. "I just- It's true, I don't know much about life. I don't know what this is… what _we_ are… but, if this is the only chance I get, I don't want to regret it!"

Her shout seemed impossibly loud, and not simply because of their proximity. It had also been profound, reaching deep within him and rattling the bars of his cage. It touched something in them both, symmetric ripples echoing out to eternity.

An eternity within themselves, Naruto noticed then that they were alone in a cocoon of snow. In every direction was a limitless white horizon, a blank slate. And the innumerable water crystals let the light shine through to banish darkness in every corner.

"…I get it."

Banishing regret, the world was never so clear.

Ruby was the one caught off-guard this time, her hood falling over their heads and hiding the small act of intimacy from those millions of tiny, clear eyes. They themselves stopped looking and settled for fumbling forward together. Touching, speaking with that primitive brail, more was said in those few minutes than in all the lifetimes which came before.

"Time's up."

"Eep!"

Ripped from his grasp and the frozen vug, Ruby found herself suddenly back in the brisk morning air and being dangled by the scruff by none other than Glynda Goodwitch.

"That's one. Here." As she was unceremoniously passed off to Winter, Ruby was never so glad for her crimson mantle which helped hide her whole-body flush. "And the other…"

"Matte, matte- wait!" Naruto burst forth and stumbled from the icy womb like a newborn foal, limbs flailing desperately at the business end of Glynda's weapon.

"About time," Glynda groused, glancing back at her fellow 'adult' who was busily scribbling in a notebook. "This is only because you didn't help."

"Maa, but you looked to have it handled so nicely." Ending his scribbled with a flourish and giggle, Jiraiya stowed both notebook and pen in his haori. "Besides, if I had 'helped', we'd have been here all day. And while we're not pressed for time, I imagine Oz would start to get antsy. Let's go, Brat!"

Giving the growling Glynda a wide birth, Naruto made to follow his sensei without further delay but was accosted by the gaze of a woman he only knew by reputation. It was clear that although they didn't know one another, Winter wanted to impart something to him.

"Uzumaki Naruto," Even in that familiar configuration, his name sounded very official coming from her lips. "Don't think… that you can just disappear after this is done."

He blinked, not understanding for the longest time. It was as if the words were meant for someone else, but in the moment that their eyes met, she thought it applied to him as well.

In any case, he nodded his acceptance. Turning his back, he walked away- but without really doing either. He was a part of this world now, and could not simply distance himself from the mark he had made.

Winter did not watch the living relic go, instead, ushering her charges into the idling staff car which would take them to general Ironwood. Only when all the doors to the vehicle were shut did she allow herself a pause and acknowledged the presence behind her.

"You don't have to hide, you know. You're perfectly willing to ride **inside** the car." But behind her was only sounds of the airfield, waning engines of the military bird and the lonely cawing of crows. "Unless, you _prefer_ to fly in this cold."

"I've had worse." With his hands in his pockets, Qrow stuck to the armored car's copious blind spots as he approached. "Besides, I'd think it'd be less hostile than the usual _warm welcome_ I receive up here."

"Times have changed," was all Winter said as she moved around to the passenger's seat, forcing Qrow to either follow or to be left behind. "Besides, I'd think you'd want to stick close to your niece. You are supposed to protect her, after all."

"I doubt she'd want her uncle cramping her style." The man shrugged with his hands in his pockets, trying to pretend like it wasn't because they were numb. "I know Oz wants to keep her safe, but you got to let the kids spread their wings a little, right?"

Hand on the door handle, Winter looked back at him with what he could have sworn was less animosity than he was used to.

"Very well. I'll leave a window cracked for you then."

In a blink, she had whisked herself into the car and it had sped off, leaving Qrow now well and truly alone on that patch of man-made nothingness in the frozen north.

"Huh," He huffed, taking a medicinal swig from his flask to stave off the cold. "I guess things really have changed."

* * *

"This leg of the journey should be considerably shorter," Glynda stated as she settled herself into the pilot's seat. "This military Bullhead is outfitted for long-range reconnaissance patrols and should get us there in less than six hours given that it will be a direct flight and we won't have to stop for fuel," She watched out the windshield as the Atlesian ground crew finished their final inspection, clamping down exposed panels and detaching the thick hose from their fuel tank before retreating to the safety of their hangar. She then set about her own pre-flight checklist, routine guiding her fingers as her eyes glazed over the instrument panel. "Hopefully, that will also give us the element of surprise."

"Oh, I doubt it, but your optimism is endearing." Her 'copilot' ignored her glare with practiced ease, with more familiarity than which he lowered his girth into the other chair and sought out the manual controls with his meaty fingers. "And I like your euphemism for a 'direct flight' instead of 'one-way ticket'."

The military-grade metal armrest whined under her grip as she glared daggers at the unperturbed Jiraiya.

"Hmm, you seem tense Glynda-chan. Would you like a back massage? I just so happen to be an expert- assuming my hands haven't lost their touch. You'll have to forgive me if they start to wander." His digits found the controls easily enough, digital knowledge converting to muscle memory as he ran through the same preparations. "Huh, what was that?"

"…How can you be so damned calm?"

Though this was asked with a seemingly level voice, the assistant headmaster was anything but her normally unflappable self. If the deformed metal under her grip and the strained curse word in her sentence weren't enough, Jiraiya had seen this look one to many times to forget it.

"Maa, you should be the one to be calm, Glynda-chan." Jiraiya absently picked up the headset and looked at it with disdain, trying and failing several times to fit it over his bushy mane without any luck.

"How can you say that?!" She wasn't shouting, not yet.

"Don't get me wrong," Abandoning the electronic communications, he turned to give the woman the full intensity of his regard. "We're not out here to die. If anything, we know just how valuable life is. Which is also why you have nothing to worry about. If worse comes to worse, we'll make sure you get out. One way or another."

Though she still harbored doubts about their success, Glynda knew they could do this. More than that, she realized that they meant it, the old hermit speaking for the other three in the truncated passenger space behind. The promise caught in her throat, as she was not used to digesting such a thing.

"But…"

"You're still thinking like Ozpin," She sucked in a breath at both the accusation and the use of the man's full name. "You believe I am ignorant to what he thinks? Trust me, he is not the first. It makes all too much sense to send **us** into the belly of the beast. Everything goes well, we defeat the baddy and save Remnant. Things don't go so well, he's at least sent a retaliation. Not to mention, he'd be rid of a several troubling persons whom might've otherwise lived long enough to become a threat to his own plans."

She wanted to deny this callous assessment, not only for the headmaster's sake but her own conscience. Once again, finding that she was unable to form an objection.

"I can't blame him for that. Hell, I'd be worried if he weren't at least a little cautious. I'd be more the fool if I left the world in the hands of an idiot." Barking a laugh, he thought to his own endearing idiot and wondered what, if anything, made Naruto different. "Likewise, you can't blame Oz for having you tag along. It's not because you're expendable. Just the opposite. I know that man thinks the world of you and wouldn't trust anyone else to keep an eye on us troublemakers."

Looking down at her lap, Glynda tried to wrestle her doubts like her hands which were unconsciously wringing her own headset.

"It's because, despite the odds, he wants to believe we can do it." Jiraiya flicked a switch and the engines gasped for oxygen, roaring to life the second they caught its first whiff. "He can't put all his eggs in one basket, but he can bet on hope."

"And… can you?" Not wanting to hope either, Glynda looked out the front windshield to the future that she could see on the horizon. "Can you do it? Defeat this evil that's been plaguing us for as long as we've been here?"

Jiraiya smiled goofily, and against the odds, Glynda found her tension somewhat lessening.

"You bet your pretty little ass we can, missy."

That was one bet that just might be worth taking.

* * *

"She said that she wanted to be alone," the man grunted, crossing his arms and doing his best to let his thick skin shut out both the pained cries and the pitiful whimpers flooding the cavernous halls, "I'd be a fool to risk going in there without being called- and I'll be equally damned if I let you do so without her express permission."

More animal than human at the moment, the Faunus hissed at this denial and continued to pace furiously within an imaginary cage, his barbed tail snapping back and forth like a whip.

"How can you just- No! No, no, no, my Queen cannot be disturbed… Agh! The waiting, can't stand- need to do something- need to, need to, need to kill…"

"You're welcome to take those thoughts outside," Unfolding his arms in preparation for a conflict that had been a long-time coming, the large man stepped up and interrupted the other man's course. "Otherwise… I'll consider you a liability, Tyrion."

Hands clenching like claws- itching for his weapons yet holstered by his side, Tyrion stalked up until he was nose-to-nose with Hazel despite the other man's towering stature.

"That so? Well, why don't we just see then, hm? A broken tool is no use to my Queen anyway… so if I break you, she won't mind!"

Manic anticipation in Tyrion's eyes was penetrating Hazel's cool. The large man wasn't unaware of this, but his only consideration currently was whether that swaying scorpion's tail in the background could pierce his hide.

"Either you two scoundrels take this squabble outside or wait until I've finished here; but right now, the adults need to have a chat."

"Finally!" Fortunately, it was relief which broke the normally calm man's patience as he turned towards the latecomer who was summarily strutting his way down the tiled halls. "What in blazes took you so long, Dr. Watts?"

"Hmph! Unlike the reclusive reality you two live in, one cannot just come and go from society." Smoothing out his moustache and trying to do the same for his nerve, Dr. Watts stopped before the other two servants of Salem who were lingering outside the door to her chamber. "If only either of you had any idea how difficult it was to secure a position inside the SDC, let alone how many bribes it took to be put in charge of the Fox-Island operation… damn that woman! So much hard work- gone, in an instant! If only I could have stayed a few more weeks, I'd have made sure Winter Schnee would never be a problem for us again…"

Restraining himself before he reignited the room's tensions again, Watts knew that such an attitude wouldn't be appreciated in front of his patron, anyhow.

"What are you two doing just standing outside anyway? Haven't you anything better to be doing?"

The two who posted sentinel glared at their common enemy, begging him to listen to the continued cries emanating from behind the thick, oaken doors.

"What in the name of…"

"She's been like that for several days now," Hazel grunted, folding his arms once again to restrain his own desire to check on their mistress. "Ever since _your_ failure, Dr. Watts."

"Our Queen is in pain…" Clawing at his already long face, Tyrion shuffled forward on his knees towards the reverberating door.

"I cannot say what happened, as neither of us were there." Clamping his eyes shut in shame, Hazel's feet shuffled restlessly beneath his girth. "There was a flash of light which engulphed the manor, piercing through the very walls. And then, we heard the first sounds of conflict and rushed to her aid."

Another shrill cry shook them like the glass in the window frames.

"I see…" Mussing up his already perfect facial hair, Watts consulted his knowledge on the mysterious entity known as Salem and correlated it with what had happened on the island.

Pensive eyes widened as he realized something- but before he did, he realized that the noises had stopped.

"Do you hear that?"

Silence.

" **You may enter now…** "

The three subordinates of the Witch looked at one another with varying degrees of dubiousness. But they realized that no matter who awaited them behind that door, they could not defy them.

There were obvious signs of a struggle upon entering the hall, but no sign of the perpetrator. The room's sole occupant sat in plain sight at the head of the long table, sprawled rather undignified in the imposingly high-backed chair. Almost as if she had just recently crawled her way into its grasp before they entered, her shoulders visibly heaved and a free hand tore at the armrest like it was searching for something.

It was so arresting, so patently different than the omnipotent air they had come to associate with their leader that the three stopped dead in their tracks.

" **Well? What are you waiting for?** " But her voice was death itself. And behind the splayed hand covering her face, a single, twisted red eye glared out at them, delivering orders that they were compelled to obey.

" **It's time to welcome our guests.** "

* * *

The car ride away from the airfield quickly devolved into an awkward silence. Winter had little idea what to say to her own sister, let alone the other three. Two of which were busy pretending that they weren't as wrapped-up in their thoughts as their young leader who watched wistfully out the window.

Through the rearview mirror, Winter herself watched the lone contrail as it disappeared over the horizon and sighed.

Why was it so hard to look ahead?

"Come in," Time passed, doors opened and closed, and soon they found themselves before Winter's boss who was busily scribbling away on one of the many data-pads that littered his table-sized desk. "Welcome,"

Putting this down and standing, to Winter's further chagrin, Ironwood gestured for his guests to make themselves comfortable. She was almost glad to dismiss herself with a quiet bow and slink off to hide until she could figure out how to balance who she was with who she wanted to be.

"I am glad to see that you four are alright," The general's sincerity was clearly felt as he all but fell back into his chair. "Circumstances when we last met were quite chaotic to say the least. While things are hardly calm now," He snorted, gesturing to the assemblage of screens all glaring at him, "Atlas escaped most of the direct fallout. Apart from a potential economic collapse, realistically, I imagine that your time here will be much more restful than if you had stayed in Vale."

But relief didn't last long, and soon Ironwood's face fell back into the pensive wrinkles it had formed from many hours of deliberation.

"Frankly, this itself is why I find Ozpin sending you here to be odd. Would it not be better to have all available hands help with protection and reconstruction of Vale, rather than send four capable huntresses such as yourself on what amounts to paid vacation?"

Said huntresses either didn't know what to say to this, or else knew they should say nothing. As captain, it was Ruby's responsibility to respond to this offhand slight. But the girl still appeared to hardly know where she was, much less what they were getting into.

"I'm sure that Ozpin had his reasons for sending us here," Blake offered, having none of her teammates' qualms and with Ruby abdicating her responsibility. Though it wasn't necessarily easy to hold back her own contempt when talking to the military man. "Besides, it seems to me that you are rather overwhelmed yourself, General. Can you really be sure that nothing has escaped your oversight?"

With the wisdom and restraint from years of being both a headmaster and military officer, Ironwood stopped himself from getting into a heated argument with the sarcastic Faunus and kept his displeasure to a frown.

"I'd be a fool if I said yes. However, I **do** have my own subordinates whom I trust to handle important matters." While out of sight, there was little doubt that Winter was exactly where she needed to be, at his beck and call. This thought, or another, caused Ironwood to sigh. "Regardless, Ozpin has a right to be paranoid, and I don't intend to start stepping on his toes now of all times. Yes, on the surface everything appears to have gone fine. The extraction of our forces from Vale transpired without any major military- and more importantly, without _political_ blunders. And our own Kingdom obviously did not sustain any direct damage from Salem's opening move.

"…However, what you four must see as a divine act has the administration on edge. The very nature of Dust has changed irreparably, and we won't be able to conceal the truth from people for very long. Apart from the inexplicable lights, most of our generators can no longer function in their current configuration. We're working on conversions right now and distributing them as fast as we can. But there is a human limit, both to our efforts and to patience. Some of the citizenry are already decrying this event as a conspiracy from the SDC to gouge prices even more.

"As much as you four don't want to hear it- and believe me or not, it pains me too- we can't have people knowing the truth just yet. There is too much chaos in the world already, and a reveal like this would divide us even more. I'm even hesitant to call us 'lucky', but I fathom it would have been even worse if more of the Shinobi had retained their sentience. Instead, we get to feast upon their flesh for a little longer."

Under the admonishing stares of the full team, Ironwood sighed, realizing he'd been doing this a lot lately. Age, his own and the times themselves were catching up too quickly to evade any longer.

"It seems like we will never be free of the debt we owe our forefathers. All our fruits are fertilized by their blood. Even now, in this day and age, they continue to lay down their lives for us willingly.

"I don't expect you all to condone what I do. In truth, I would not want you to. Old men like me only know how to maintain the status quo, preserve this society built on the ashes of what came before.

"Perhaps it is too much to ask you all - yet, I know I must. No one else can do it." Standing again, only this time, Ironwood braced himself with the assistance of arms that were not really his. The hiss of hydraulics mimicking his discomfort. "Please, bear with my kind a little while longer. Ozpin's generation and my own have not always done what is right, we may not always agree but on one thing: we want to clear the way for those like you to dream. Your day will come, and when it does, please build a world unburdened by the sins of the past."

Another silence pervaded after this plea- this eulogy for a dying world. Everyone knew they had been living in a Remnant, feasting upon the scraps of a civilization that came before. It hadn't occurred to them that history might be repeating itself until Ironwood spelled it out. Their Scrolls still worked- Bullheads still flew, trains still rolled, and they still had food in their bellies- but for how long?

And for how long afterwards would they have to stave off this imminent collapse? Their whole lives? Longer?

Of Remnant's many legends, their oldest stories told of people being born from the dust of dying stars. Even those lights winking in the night sky so far overhead were not so divorced from what happened beneath their gaze. Even if they reached for the heavens, would anything change?

"Don't worry, General," With a gaze that was still removed from their plane of existence, Ruby spoke up. Her hand clutching the arm which seemed to want to break free on its own and carve a path to this future by itself. "We won't disappoint."

* * *

"Coast is 4 knots out, I'm taking us down to the tree line to avoid detection."

Without waiting for a response, Glynda eased the controls with the fineness of threading a needle. Soon they were weaving through the trees which became more and more threadbare the deeper they went into the forbidden continent. The ship did not flinch from this course except to respond to her precise commands.

"It's cute how you think that." If only her 'copilot' could do the same. "But I'm afraid that being stealthy was never really an option. See?"

No less persuasive than her command, this small request caused Glynda to forget her ire and crane her neck as she scanned for potential threats.

"Shit!"

The curse was uncharacteristic for the woman. But her mouth wasn't obeying her in the face of a flock of Nevermore which were matching their flightpath, practically sticking to their hull to take advantage of its blind spots. Worse yet, her controls didn't seem to be responding to her commands either, even as she wrestled them with all the strength of a full-fledged huntress.

"Calm down,"

"Why on Remnant-?!" Already confused by the Sanin's coolness, Glynda stopped short as she realized that he was the one who stayed their course with meaty hands clamped around the mirrored controls. "-Jiraiya! What the hell do you think you're doing?!"

"Take a good look," He bade her, brown eyes hardened to steel and staring straight ahead. "How long do you think they've been shadowing us? If they were going to attack, they would've done it already. These buzzards aren't scouts or guards, they're _escorts_."

After holding herself in that ridged stare for longer than she could count, the assistant headmistress of Beacon did something she rightfully never thought she'd be able to do.

She relaxed and just went with it. Falling back into the Bullhead's padded captain's chair, she relinquished her hold on the controls and let the ancient shinobi guide her fate.

"I really need to put in for some time-off after this."

"What? You don't think of this as a vacation?" Grinning with impunity, Jiraiya looked to the woman slumped over in the next seat. "Going new places, meeting new people- you don't even have to lift a finger. Just relax Glynda-hime and we'll take it from here."

"Do I have a choice?"

"Nope," Jiraiya's smile was not nearly as playful as the pop at the end of his P. "You're in the same boat now. Feel free to do whatever you want, but we're all headed the same place, eventually." He snorted at his own accidental wisdom. "Might as well enjoy it. Read a book or something."

Thinking of the available reading material which included the pilot's manual, a brochure for the Fox islands and Jiraiya's own dubiously-dubbed 'literature', Glynda rejected this daydream.

"Pass."

"Fine. Just remember that it's your choice."

* * *

The recon Bullhead's passenger compartment was truncated, streamlined to reduce weight and increase range of the craft. Barely enough for the three shinobi who waited keenly for their arrival, otherwise all but blind to circumstances on the other side of that duralumin skin.

Their ride was no more comfortable than that of the huntresses who they had last seen speeding off in the other direction. It was cramped, a military craft and not meant for luxury. But that was not the cause of the uneasiness. In fact, in each of the two rows of seats there was yet room for another couple bodies - and **that** was the problem.

"You wonder if there's more out there?" Naruto asked, not daring to be hopeful. "Do you think anyone else made it?"

It was not a surprise that it was the blond who broke the solemn silence, even if he was the one who instigated it. Shino and Shikamaru had been perfectly content to sit quietly (sleep) until the time they were needed.

*Sigh…*

-Well, content wasn't quite the right word. Shikamaru was hankering for a smoke that was not possible in their pressurized cabin. But even the feelings of withdrawal were somewhat preferable to dealing with this can of worms.

"Does it really matter?" Fingers itching for a cigarette, Shikamaru tucked them under his armpits and scrunched his face up so he didn't have to see the look of betrayal on the blonde across from him. "If they're dead, they're dead. If not… they'll find us."

Maybe, if they survived that long.

"Shika- how can you be so heartless?! What about our friends? What about Ino, Cho-"

"Why do you think that we do not care about our comrades?" Shino interrupted. He was close, like they all were, but enough that they could feel the emotions he declined to show. "Over an Aburame's lifetime, millions of our comrades will perish. Why must people assume that we do not mourn for them? They are small, insignificant compared to human life. But is not human life insignificant compared to humanity?"

Almost as startling as the sudden outburst was when Shino leaned in close to his comrade, and Naruto could see his own fecklessness reflected in those cool shades.

"-No. It is not. Each life is important, no matter how small. Desire is not something to be ashamed of." He sat back, upright against the canvas-backed bucket seat like it never even happened. "Now is not our time. We will join our comrades… in time."

Naruto wanted to protest, to say something, but was cut off by the lazy genius being proactive for once.

"Don't go looking for excuses, Naruto. It isn't like you." Sighing once again, Shikamaru allowed himself to unfold and lean back- as much was possible in that nook. "Don't you think it's high-time to get rid of that useless guilt? You don't need to go sacrificing yourself to atone for something that's not your fault."

"But-"

Seeing the futility of his actions, he chose instead to look into the clouded eyes of his friend. "Even if our friends aren't here anymore, they'd want you to be happy. You don't need them as an excuse to die… nor to live."

"What'd you mean by that?" Naruto asked with greater trepidation than was elicited from this potential suicide mission.

"…The number of people waiting for you here or _there_ doesn't matter. She's enough, isn't she?" Shikamaru had held his suspicions for a while… no, that wasn't true. He'd known since the moment Naruto surfaced in the world once again, that the person he dragged with him would have to be special. "No one'd blame you, for wanting to return for her- _to_ her."

In a younger time, Naruto might have denied knowing what his friend was talking about. But ignorance was something he no longer deserved, and a clean conscience not something he could afford.

"Are you sure about that?" He asked, looking towards the floor- through it, down into the darkest pits which he imagined were anxious to receive him.

"Tch, you better _believe it_."

For a second thinking it was just engine noise, Naruto couldn't help but snort in disbelief and an irony which somehow absolved everything.

"You sound stupid."

"Yeah, yeah. Don't get used to it."

Two sharp raps like a conductor's wand metered out on the metal wall separating them from the cockpit, stifling their goodwill.

"Looks like it's showtime," Popping a cigarette in his mouth in anticipation, Shikamaru threw open the bay doors to reveal a barren landscape that was gently rising to meet them.

"Time to face the past." With a fraction of his confidence returned and the rest quickly on its way, Naruto leapt out onto the ground before their craft had even landed.

"Troublesome…" Shikamaru muttered, following the blond if for no other purpose than to keep an eye on him and get far enough away to where the whirling engines wouldn't douse his cigarette.

Left alone in the slowly landing aircraft, Shino noticed something else fighting against those gale-force winds. In no hurry, he waited for that black and red speck being buffeted on the tempest with his hand held out for a perch. The ladybug came to rest on his outstretched finger, and the Aburame brought it in close to his regard.

"Well done," He commended the intrepid flyer which slowly crept its way along his digit. "You too, must fight."

Hardly noticing when the craft came to its own rest, Shino looked up from his inspection to see Shikamaru and Naruto standing in front of an imposing portcullis, Jiraiya and soon Goodwitch strutting out to meet them.

"…Though which is waiting for us, I wonder? The past, or the future?"

* * *

What was it that expected them on the other side of that ironwood door?

Behind them were Salem's professed henchmen, a motley crew who was sent to meet them and guide them through to the inner sanctum. They stood guard at the shinobi's backs, as if more afraid to let them leave then have them face their queen. In truth, the three characters seemed far more unnerved by the happenings than their guests, who regarded their regal welcome as a pointless tactic.

"So, she's got a few trained dogs. Big whoop." Unimpressed by the immaculate décor nor the legion of Grimm lined up on either side of the aisle, Jiraiya dug out a ball of earwax and flicked it at the nearest unflinching Beowulf.

"One does not simply _train_ Grimm," Volunteering to act as host, Dr. Watts was quickly regretting doing so as he was stuck between both groups looking to go at each other's throats. "Our Lady _commands_ them to her biding. It is by her will alone that you have made it this far into her territory."

"Oh, I wasn't talking about the overgrown puppies," Casting a sneer over his shoulder, Jiraiya reveled in the way the villain mentally tore at his face. "-And make no mistake, that's exactly what they are compared to us. If we'd wanted to, we could clear up Remnant's pest problem in a few weeks of hard work- a month, tops."

The Sanin loomed over the scrawny man who was rapidly reddening.

"Your boss knows it too, which is probably why she invited us to he little hideaway, so she can bargain for her life."

" **YEAAAAHHH!"**

None were surprised when Tyrion was first to snap. Both the Shinobi and his cohorts were prepared for it, the former getting ready to cull the potential threat and the latter wisely moving to get far away.

" **Tyrion,** " Even before Shikamaru's Shadow-bind technique could reach him, the scorpion-Faunus halted dead in his tracks, " **I don't like to be kept waiting.** "

Slinking forward with his tail between his legs, the madman cast an almost pitiable glance at the interlopers which begged them to follow him the few paces remaining.

Visible from the other end of the hall, the grandiose door stood taller than even the indominable Hazel and burly Jiraiya had they been standing on each other's shoulders. It was even more intricately engraved than the most advanced circuit boards and stained darker than a Grimm's pelt. But the shinobi regarded the portal as nothing but another obstacle to be brushed aside.

" **Enter** "

"Like I need you to tell me what to do!"

Shoving aside Tyrion who was busy deciding whether to be mortified or apoplectic, Naruto then took one grand step forward and battered down the door which had likely stood for centuries- nothing compared to his millennia of pent-up anxiety and anticipation.

After the thunderous crash, one could very well hear a pin drop. No one, not even Naruto dared to breath as he stared down that long table which was almost half the length they'd already traveled.

It was far away, but he could still see the figure that stood at the end as motionless as a statue but as alive as a virus in their blood. There was no mistaking the symptoms of pale skin and raven-colored hair- just as there was no denying the feminine figure which continued to lounge lazily at the table's head.

Naruto felt his hope rise and fall in the span of a second, his heart break and his fist clench as it tried to piece it back together.

Then the figure sneered that familiar sneer, bared down on him with crimson eyes which promised to pick apart his very soul and leave the scraps for the carrion-eaters. It wasn't even the obsidian replica of Kusanagi that rested in that slender grip, but the way it was held with a justifiable arrogance that Naruto had felt walk all over him a million times before.

"Long time no see, _Teme_."

* * *

The inside of the barracks was pitch-black, without so much as a window for the waxen moonlight to stream in. What was good for military security and sleep for weary bodies left Ruby's restive mind a blank slate on which to wander. Limitless blackness like the eternal white. She tossed and turned, debating what the difference was. She stared up to where the ceiling should be, knowing without having to see that it was different than back home.

Everything was going to be different now, wasn't it?

For that matter, where was home? These sardine-stacks of military bunks in an Atlesian military compound she shared with her team? Patch? Beacon? That little plot of land in which her mother lay?

Ah, but her other wasn't even there anymore, her ashes having slipped through Ruby's fingers and scattered to the four winds. Just like dreams, or conversely, the thought of sleep.

It was what she had wanted, though, wasn't it? Ruby too. This was a good thing. Her mother was at rest. She was alive, her sister, father, friends… Him… for now. For how long?

No, this wasn't a good thing. It just was. End of one chapter and the beginning of another. She should be excited for the possibilities, like she said she'd be.

Then why was she so darned nervous?

' _ **It is only natural to fear the unknown. And no one knows what lays ahead.'**_

This axiom awakened from the darkest corners of Ruby's mind, so close to depths of slumber that she did not ken the unfamiliar voice in which it grumbled. Instead, she sleepily curled up against its inherent warmth like the comfort of a baby blanket. This heady energy within her grasp, yet which was not hers, lulling her to serenity.

' _ **But what you're feeling now…'**_ The hot October winds slowly breathed over her, tickling her ears. And eyes like the sun creeping over the horizon looked down at the Autumn child within their care, so much alike the one which had lain there before. _**'… is called experience.'**_

That's right, this was the beginning.


	21. Anthropocene

**_Anthropocene_ \- the geologic age wherein human activity is the dominating factor controlling the environment.**

* * *

"Ohisashiburi, Naruto."

The person-creature- _thing_ lurking at the far end of the table drawled in a sultry maleficence.

"Oi, oi. Is this what happens when you don't have me around to check you?" Unnerved and cautious, Naruto retreated into his persona at the same time he took a challenging step forward. "First off, don't 'cha think your Emo's gotten a bit out of hand with all the black-goth shit? Not to mention, you might've let the whole 'prettyboy' thing go to your head a little. If this is to avoid the fangirls, I get it. But I also hate to break it to you, but things have changed since our time, and well, these days girls don't _have_ to like boys, -ttebayo?"

Some were stunned to silent incomprehension, whereas others in the room knew exactly what he was doing, and were simply awaiting the verdict the same as he.

Somewhere between a snort and a scoff, either of which dashed the refinement Salem built up around herself with the one sound.

"Once a Dobe, always a Dobe."

The feminine lips twisted into a snarl as if disgusted with the way the word tasted in her mouth. At the same time, the witch's frail body hauled itself onto its feet with the aid of the Kusanagi lookalike, grunting in unladylike exertion.

"It's true, though." The whole room waited on bated breath for whomever it was to rise to their not-quite full height, and to finish this thought which was not-quite unique. "Everything you say. Without your annoying pestering, I've let myself slip." Slouching in that body which was meant to remain rigidly upright, they tested their grip and watched as spindly fingers trembled into a fist. "Too much… too far. I was consumed… But, things _have_ changed, and we must get used to them."

"Who… are you?"

Just as Naruto was beginning to solidify this in his mind, others were having their previous images torn apart. The loyal Tyrion surged forward next to the shinobi, but no further as he was halted by an invisible barrier called the truth.

"You… are not Salem. What have you done to my Lady?"

The single-minded creature before them might have been pitiable, but received nothing but contempt from the one who wore his savior's visage.

"The witch is dead." Sasuke sneered, looking down his- _her_ nose and the vast distance between them. "Although, I suppose she died a long time ago."

A shrill scream pierced the halls, rattled the leaden glass and forced them to their knees with hands clamped over their ears to drown out the howl. One moment had had Tyrion frozen in abject desolation, the next saw him flying towards the other side of the room.

The change had happened at the speed of madness so that none were quite prepared to stop him. None even tried, as his target waited lazily at the end of his sting without moving a muscle.

None was needed.

"Tsukuyomi,"

It was a whisper that penetrated their consciences as profoundly as the scream, and the silence which followed contained the note still ringing in their ears.

"And yet, what is really so different? Male, female, Humans, Faunus- **Grimm** , all the same. All beasts." Sasuke- for it could be no other- paced forward, now with the entranced Tyrion following like the loyal dog he was. The transmigrated shinobi looked up to the broken moon with only the slightest frown of disappointment at the corner their face. "Not even a clean slate could cleanse the world of sin."

"You're wrong."

"Oh? You've seen what I've seen. Tell me, what do you think of the world _you_ created, Naruto? You won, after all. Madara wasn't allowed to complete his infinite Tsukuyomi, and now it is impossible even if one were to try."

Sasuke waited expectantly. He might have emerged from slumber with a backlog of words, but he was never one for rhetoric. And even though Naruto's friends wanted to give their support, this was a question that only the blond could answer. A bystander, Glynda watched this all unfold in silent rapture, understanding only that she was witnessing history which no one else alive would - not even Ozpin.

"No," This one word and the clenching of a fist reverberated in the empty hall. "I've spent forever blaming myself for not doing enough- I _still_ do. But you know what? That isn't fair to the people who've accomplished so much **despite** the crappy world **we** managed. That's right, you're in this too, Sasuke. Just like you've always been, even if you try to deny it. This is your world just as much as mine. **You** wanted there to be no shinobi. If it's not to your liking, well then tough shit."

Digesting this rebuttal with the same impassivity, Sasuke cocked his head.

"You're not the same either, are you?" Naruto felt the tables turned as those all-seeing eyes regarded him with suspicion. "You agree, then, that people are no different now than before? There is no changing them."

Sasuke gave a general gesture, sweeping across the ones loyal to the witch, the shinobi, the huntress.

"Look at them- look at yourselves. Inevitably drawn to conflict. This was the reason you came here, the reason I invited you. This one," Finally motioning to Tyrion who perked up eagerly at the attention, "He believes I am Salem, and why should I take that from him? He will not be sated without blood. Is it better that I allow him his indulgence or pacify him with the illusion?

"What is wrong and what is right? It's been so long I don't think I can even tell anymore. Both are as pervasive as the blight which is life. Both were supposed to be stricken from this planet and yet," Throwing up slender hands to encompass all of them, the entirety of their goodness and their faults, "Here we are again."

"Are we gonna throw down, or what?"

Not showing if he was disappointed, Sasuke lowered the pale arms of his ghost and stared unblinkingly at his one-time friend.

"I suppose that depends on your answer."

"Yes," While the two of them were still, the rest tensed in nervous anticipation. Suddenly, both Hazel and Dr. Watts were made to realize just how precarious their positions were, and they looked at one another in strange commiseration. "… If I have to. I'll do it again and again until you understand, Sasuke."

"Understand **what?** " Still not moving a muscle, yet Sasuke brought to bear force unrivaled outside of myth and legend. "What can you tell me that eons of ruminations have not?"

"You're right."

It was as if all the candles in the world had been extinguished at once. Black flames which might or might not have been an illusion behind Sasuke abruptly waned, and the heartbeats of living and dead paused in reverence.

"What?"

"You're right. I've thought a lot too, believe it or not. And… I'm not sure we'll ever come to a perfect answer." Hanging his head, the blond shook it slowly, and it was not clear if it was in resignation or defiance. "What's right and what's wrong? I've watched for so long and seen it change as people come and go. I can't even claim to have always done what's right even by myself. I can't say we'll ever know."

Looking up, at last they saw eye to eye. There was determination in those blue glaciers, enough to quench all the fire in the universe. Not all at once, but at slow, creeping, yet inevitable pace. And once Sasuke saw that, he knew that the decision had been made.

"-But I do know that we have to try. The fact that right and wrong have differed means that things _**do**_ change, not just our perception of them. Life is so much more than a thought or an illusion. Amazing, incredible things have come out of nowhere- and I'm not talking just about Faunus. Thoughts, ideas that we never would've dreamed of given another billion years to do it are suddenly _real!_

"Life is real. Our actions are real, and they affect everyone else, stretching far into the future. Above right and wrong, we must be prepared to live with them and their consequences. Because life is our blessing and our burden.

"… And that's why if you try to take it away in any shape or form, I'll stop you."

A battle was carried out silently between the two, immutable tectonics grinding at one another. Until, at long last, a chuckle fissured the air. Then a guffaw, then full-blown laughter erupted with separate tones mixing together like magma.

"You **have** changed," Sasuke commended, hiding his remaining titters with the back of his fist, "But, it's good to see that you're the same old Dobe."

"Pardon me for interrupting what is obviously a _profound_ conversation," The brief diffusion of tensions was enough to allow Dr. Watts' sarcasm to be squeezed through. "-But what in the _hell_ is going on here?!"

Tyrion growled animally at the man for interrupting, but it was obvious that he was a collared dog. The implicit threat came from the ones who didn't move, stifling the questions that the others dared not ask.

"It's over," Piercing red eyes were fixed on the doctor but Sasuke spoke generally, far past the confines of the continent. "All the plans Salem had for this world are defunct. The cycle is broken. With the Gedō Mazō destroyed, the lost souls finally have the chance to move on."

"The end of Grimm," Breathless, as if he had just gotten through running a marathon, halfheartedly Shikamaru fumbled for a cigarette which then just remained between his fingers, unlit and forgotten.

"Eventually," Sasuke conceded. "With the souls reunited, they will no longer reform indefinitely. But the spirits are still trapped within the madness which is the Grimm construct. Not even my Sharingan can pacify their animal instincts forever. However, if I relinquish control now, a great many will be lost to the darkness. They must each be returned, forcibly."

"So, we still need to hunt monsters," Jiraiya surmised.

"-But now with the knowledge that behind each is a living soul," At last, Glynda was catching up with the conversation. And for the first time in a long time, wishing she'd remained ignorant.

"And if allowed to linger, they will be human spirits trapped within beasts," Sasuke seemed to argue, "Not unlike the Bijῡ." The old Sasuke would have shrugged in apathy, but this new amalgamation did so more in weariness. "Either way, things cannot be allowed to return to the way they were."

"Is this really possible? Are we agreeing on something?" Feigning sarcasm, Naruto really couldn't comprehend this profound change in his friend and rival, continuing to look at this as a misdirection.

"-Don't look too much into it, Baka." It was still strange the way Salem's lips curved to form Sasuke's signature smirk, but he supposed he would get used to it.

"So what now, kid?" Remaining skeptical, Jiraiya had not abandoned his plans to fight their way out of the Grimm-infested manor. "You sayin' you're just going to let us walk on out of here? Or do we need to take care of your 'pest' problem too?"

Sasuke fixed the Sanin with a dirty glare, and both Hazel and Watts looked between the two while wondering which were the supposed 'pests': them, or the Grimm.

"You will not touch them. You will leave, and never come back."

"Wait a minute-"

Sasuke raised a hand, stifling the objection before it was even asked.

"I know you're obligated to try and get me to return with you, Naruto. And I have grown to appreciate that quality of yours." Even more foreign than the face which bore it was the sad smile Sasuke graced him with. "But we have different experiences and will never see eye to eye. Regardless of what you may have thought of her, Salem viewed the Grimm as her children. This notion, however twisted, was more powerful than the hate Sasuke Uchiha once held. It was more powerful than Salem herself possibly realized.

"Therefore, I will build my world, here, from the ground up. Just as life and you have given me the chance, I wish to give the chance for these souls to live free of the society which hunted them, and free of the one which forced them to kill one another."

Back in the hallway, Grimm yet stood at attention, still placated by the Sharingan's lullaby for a while longer. When the dream ended, there was no telling whether they would remember that they had ever once been human. Beasts, perhaps, but also possibly something more. This possibility was owed to those who had been reaped before their time, the ones Naruto had been unable to save.

Thus, he was unable to argue.

"Then, that's it, then?" He asked hesitantly, despondently and he was forced to realize leaving his friend behind once again. "We just leave each other alone?"

"The rest of Remnant cannot live under the threat of Grimm, especially if they regain sentience." Sober argument, but with the slightest somber tone. "I will be counting on you to see that happen. I will gather as many Grimm on this continent as I can before they are purged. But after that, the two shall be separate."

"Never to meet again."

"Not right away, at least," Smirking wryly, neither truly held out much hope for this, but Sasuke felt that he was obligated to give that possibility. "But, one never knows what the future might hold."

"Oh…" Shoulders slumped, and just as quickly perked up as Naruto threw his hands behind his head and laughed out loud. "Phew! Well, I don't know about anyone else, but I think I can live with this. To tell the truth, it's a bit of a relief! I really thought we were gong to have to have some kind of epic battle to the death or something."

A sudden surge of electricity cackled along with this expression of relief.

"Oh, I never said we **wouldn't**." The ethereal blade had suddenly gained an edge, and red lightning sparkled up and down its length. Holding it in a slender grip, Sasuke dragged the blade across the tiled floor as he stalked forward with a pronounced sway. "After all, I have to make sure you're up to keeping your word."

Stunned stillness suddenly gave way to two reactions: Naruto grinned manically while the rest of his team and the two stragglers wisely retreated- even though there was probably no distance safe enough.

"Once more, for old time's sake?" A typhoon tussled his hair, emanating from a swirling, blue sphere in his palm.

"No, this is for today and tomorrow." Behind them, the towering windows burst from their combined pressures and the shards were whisked away by the manmade storm. "Let's see if you can actually give me a challenge this time, Dead Last."

"Bring it on, Bastard."

* * *

"Are you going to be alright?"

"I should probably be asking you the same thing?"

Blinking owlishly at her teammate as the tables were turned, Ruby opened and closed her mouth twice before the answer came to her.

"Yes," Looking not to the black-haired girl next to her, but towards the future, she nodded unhesitatingly. "I have to be."

"Good," Approval came from behind them, marching up with precisely placed footsteps, "Because you both need to keep your head in the game. There's only so much preparation one can do. Situations can change in the blink of an eye, and sometimes the only thing you can do is be prepared to react."

"Is that an order?" Blake narrowed her gaze at the Schnee- not their usual one- and folded her arms defiantly. "-Because we don't need a lesson."

"No," Winter spoke softly as if to herself, not deviating from her hawkeyed stare of the crowds laid out before them. "But the fact is, we could all use a reminder now and then."

"A reminder that the General doesn't trust us?"

"Blake…" Halting her admonishment, Ruby saw the corner of their minder's lips twitch upwards wryly.

"I doubt he would have given me the day off if that were the case."

Faltering in her standoffishness, Blake looked between her leader and the supposedly ranking officer. "Then…"

"With Weiss off to see our _father,_ your team is temporarily down a member. And three sets of eyes are better than two when you're looking for a Fang amidst a sea of gnashing teeth." Matter-of-factly, Winter scanned the legions of yelling protestors while looking for something else entirely. "-Though four sets are better still. Speaking of which…"

"I'm here, I'm here," Huffing, Yang pushed past the fringes of the mob and the police tape before leaping up to the small patio overlook to join her team and the tag-along. "It took longer than I thought to get through that mess. Can you believe none of the Atlas stiff-erm, soldiers thought I was really here on official business?"

"Not unexpected," Glancing at girl who was outfitted more for tourism than counter-terrorism, Winter kept her opinions off her face. "With the mutation of the Dust, systems are down all over Atlas. Updates are sporadic and official orders have to be verbally disseminated. The on-duty shift should have been informed, but I'll have a word with their commanding officer."

Not expecting such frank helpfulness, Yang blinked at the woman who looked so much like their teammate but was admittedly far more humble.

"Uh, thanks."

"One shouldn't have to be thanked for doing their job." Grimacing, the three student huntresses cringed even if they felt that this admonishment wasn't for them. "More is expected of us now than before, and just doing the minimum won't cut it."

"It seems that your people have things handled, though." Yang appraised, surveying the open plaza which had been sectioned off for this government-approved protest. Neat grids had been drawn across every street so that the gathering felt more like a concert than a public outcry. "Captain What's-His-Face said as much when I talked to him."

"Cpt. Merkwürdigliebe," Winter sighed this mouthful, "-Is a competent soldier and runs a tight ship. But he is also… old-fashioned."

Between the protesters' signs they could catch glimpses of an off-white wall of nylon and steel. Soldiers armed with rubber bullets and high-pressure fire hoses were prepared to use them against the predominantly Faunus rabble-rousers. And news trucks were stationed with state-sanctioned reporters, prepared to spin the truth whatever way best suited the party line.

"A tried and true method," Blake sneered with sarcasm which was not drowned out by the rising chants. She shot an accusatory sidelong glare towards their military liaison.

"The world is slow to change," Shrugging, Winter excused herself guiltlessly and without falter, "-But when it does, it can be violent and unpredictable. Sometimes the only thing you can do is force it to behave in a predictable way."

Poke a sleeping beast rather than let it awaken on its own. Winter must have known that's what she was doing by broaching this topic in front of the White Fang's heiress.

"Is that the official policy, or just yours?" Blake snarled, the respect she once held for this woman quickly diminishing.

"It's why I joined Special Forces," Stated Winter, not reacting to the tangible animosity prickling at her. "When it comes to preventing violence, we don't have to think inside the box,"

Her finger then pointed towards a space in that square, "-And often, we can take care of the problem before it ever becomes one. You see that woman there? Snow-Rabbit Faunus, 11 o'clock and rapidly making her way to the front."

Not the most conspicuous, the woman Winter's sharp eyes singled out was short with floppy ears bobbing between other heads in the crowd. She all but disappeared in amongst her countrymen and women with their assemblage of animal features and insolated garments that obscured everything. Except, now that she was pointed out, the three students noticed that she cut a large swath through the others- larger than her petite stature should have allowed. She was carrying a substantially-sized bag and appeared to be in a hurry to deliver it to the front.

Blake narrowed her eyes, animosity having a new target.

"Got her."

"I'd like you three to bring her over here," The tone was more insistent than that, but Winter turned to Ruby and made it clear that she wasn't about to usurp her command. "Please?"

"Don't you worry," Giving a thumbs-up and cheesy grin, Ruby assuaged both the officer and her team who were still worried how the shinobi's absence was going to affect their leader. "Nothing's going to happen on our watch!"

"What's the matter, don't want to get your own hands dirty?" Cracking her knuckles, Yang took the upper hand she had been given to tease Weiss's older sister.

"I don't think my presence would be appreciated down there," Winter said tactfully, sharing a knowing glance with the Faunus who remembered just why she appreciated Winter in the first place. "Besides, someone should keep an eye out just in case there're any more troublemakers. Just one is enough to turn this gather violent, and then…"

"Eh, like Rubes said, nothin'll happen on our watch!"

Before she could even blink, the three huntresses in training were gone in an Autumn sunset, red light fading and rose petals drifting down to melt with the late-Spring snow.

Winter sighed, not taking her eyes off the spot down below which had become a microcosm of confusion amidst the greater chaos.

"However, you can't always prevent things from happening," She sighed to herself, all alone, "Often, you can't even cope as the world falls apart around you. Sometimes, the only thing you can do is pick up the pieces and move on."

* * *

"What do you think, Klein, are some bridges even _worth_ mending?"

Near silently the limo hummed on, running on its backup battery in leu of the non-functional Dust turbine.

"Oh, that's right…"

Like the motor, her faithful butler Klein had been unflinchingly replaced by a machine. In fact, the automated chauffeur was a perfect analogy to her relationship with Jacques Schnee: present, but lacking any human connection.

It was also an inauspicious omen to her 'welcome' home. Regardless, Weiss knew she was obligated to make the journey. Not only because General Ironwood had personally asked her to try and talk Jacques into cooperating with the government crisis response, but because someday she hoped to fill this man's shoes.

…Didn't she?

Home, she sighed longingly out the window. Weiss would admit that she missed the snow and all that came with it. But now, there was something that she missed even more. Something she was hesitant to confirm even to herself.

The spacious back of the limousine appeared vast and lonely, at the same time it felt cramped and limiting. Ever since she was young, life had been served to her on a platter. But in the company of her team, she'd seen life spill past the silver-lined edge of all logical containers. She'd witnessed things and experienced scenarios which no amount of material wealth could ever emulate.

Feeling that she now belonged to the world, Weiss was worried about the ivory prison she was headed for.

*CLICK*

Under her nose the door locks sank into the upholstered sides with a sound that was like ice crunching beneath their wheels, locking her into that velvet-lined cell.

"-Hey! What's going on?" No longer staring out the windows, Weiss was very much focused on the here and now. But she was like a bird without her wings, for she had foolishly left _Myrtenaster_ back at the base. This did not stop her from flying from her seat and pounding on the glass privacy window separating her from the robotic driver. "Stop the car this instant and let me out!"

"I am afraid I can't do that, Ms. Schnee." Nearly falling back onto the floor as the android swiveled its head around 180˚ to look at her, Weiss was too flabbergasted to try and rationally parse the situation.

"Did my _father_ order this? I am Weiss Schnee, heiress to the SDC! What are your override codes?!"

"How droll," Weiss blinked as the flat-faced robot began to sound distinctly more human-like. There was still a disconnect there, but it was more as if they were talking through the pages of a book rather than a machine. "I suppose you are too young for that reference. Just because art lasts forever doesn't mean there are people to appreciate it. Pity. I had thought you were smarter, but I suppose grades do not serve as a true indicator of intelligence."

"Who are you?" Besides someone who could break into SDC security to supplant themselves close to her, this person could evidently also hack into Beacon's records. It was difficult not to show her nervousness in front of this unflinching machine whom she felt was analyzing her like a barcode. "And what do you want from me?"

There was a very human pause wherein she swore the unwavering red LED's looked at her with disappointment.

"You can be excused for not knowing who I am. For now. We will be introduced in just a little while. Though I am perplexed how you made it so far with your meager skills of deduction. The situation should be self-evident."

"Enlighten me." Weiss ground through clenched teeth as she began to concentrate, focusing on molding her Aura without the assistance of dust or her weapon.

*SCREEECH!*

Neither of these actions helped as she was sent forward when the limo stomped on its breaks, her face impacting harshly against the bullet-proof glass divider. Very quickly her bearings returned, and she was partly relieved to find herself still laying on the carpeted limousine interior. Not so reassuring, however, were the dozens of white-masked faces staring through the tinted windows.

"You are being kidnapped"

* * *

"Pardon us! Coming through! Official Huntsman business!"

Yang scarce needed to announce their intentions as the protestors were already taken aback by the three students' sudden appearance in their midst. They parted, flabbergasted at the boisterous announcement. For once, the girls' innocuous appearance working in their favor, as no one in the crowd was quite sure what to do with the three who cited authority but clearly weren't Atlesian soldiers.

The soldier herself was watching as they escorted the Faunus suspect over to her perch. At the same time, keeping a close eye on the rest of the crowd for any other outliers. But apart from the group of four making their way through like a water snake, the rest of the protest was still focusing their attention and animosity towards city hall and the line of robots and rifles which hadn't ebbed.

Winter narrowed her eyes as they approached. Not at the duffle-toting Faunus, but at how smoothly it all seemed to be going.

"-Hey! Wait a minute-!"

Before she herself even knew what she was doing, Winter had snatched the heavy bag from the diminutive Faunus woman and rushed it away from the square.

Soldierly instinct was divided with guilt and tact. She knew that it wasn't a good idea to be so heavy-handed in this delicate situation. Tensions were already tight between Atlas and their Faunus denizens without her adding to the list of grievances. But at the same time, she'd rather accept the blame all on her own so long as everyone else was outside the potential blast radius.

Prudence would also have waited for a proper explosive-ordinance tech, but Winter wasn't about to stand around doing nothing. Again.

A flick of the wrist and the body-sized bag was thrown into the air in two neat halves, the contents spilling out over the ground which was still frost-coated in the shade.

"What are you doing?!" Winter's offending wrist was snatched by a petite hand, but her attention was locked onto the falling debris which was full of metal and cloth- but nothing that could be recognized as a bomb. "That's not the way we do things! This isn't why Ozpin wanted us here!"

For most people, it would be difficult to accept they were wrong. Harder still to accept such scolding from a girl almost half her age. But Winter had already prepared to burn for her sins and had cast aside her pride before the first stone.

"I apologize," She muttered quietly, still not taking her concentration off the scattered contents.

Flustered and unsure of how to deal with the impulsive officer, Ruby instead turned to the Faunus they had detained and whom watched on with no small amount of surprise. However, the bag's owner was strangely devoid of upset. Curious instead, as if she hadn't known herself what was inside.

"I am so sorry," Mortified, Ruby apologized on behalf of her team and their mission which already seemed to be floundering. "We'll repay you for any of the damages."

"Hey, wait a sec-" Yang's protest was interrupted, first by Blake's gentle hand on her shoulder and then by another voice muffled by their turned back.

"No, I accept full responsibility," As she had been prepared to do since joining her sister's team unofficially, "My actions do not represent Atlas nor the team and Beacon academy."

Even as she recited this boilerplate, Winter felt that something was still wrong. And not just with her halfhearted apology.

"I am so, so, so, sorry." Ruby groveled before the Faunus woman who was little taller than she herself.

"What were you doing with this stuff anyway?" Keeping her indignation in check and one eye on Winter, Blake nonetheless harbored her own misgivings about the Faunus. Having been in the same position not long ago, she knew that these actions were suspicious. "And why were you in such a hurry?"

Turning from the nearly-prostrate team captain, the Faunus regarded her fellow with scrutiny. Her lips parted as if in a prearranged response that was withheld upon seeing whom she was dealing with.

"I-I was just b-bringing some stuff to my friends." The woman stuttered, either timid by nature or recognizing what- _who_ she was talking to, "They just told me to grab the bag from their house and bring it to them. They've been here since yesterday. I-I just assumed it was food and clothes…"

' _ **Not untrue…'**_

They all took an instinctive glance over to the scattered contents which appeared to be just what she claimed. Except that Winter was crouched over something and blocking it from their view.

'… _ **but not entirely honest, either.'**_

"I am sorry for the inconvenience," Approaching them with a calm celerity, Winter held that something she picked up tight within the folds of her civilian clothes which bore little distinction from her military outfit. "-But if you wouldn't mind explaining this…"

Tawny eyes widened and floppy ears stiffened slightly upon seeing the iconic White Fang mask brought forth.

"I-I have no idea how that got in there!" Taking a step away from its association, the Faunus found herself backed up against the immutable wall of Huntresses. "I-It's not mine! The bag's not even mine! I swear, I had no idea that any of my friends were part of the White Fang!"

' _ **That, however, was a lie.'**_

Ruby blinked at the same time as the rabbit Faunus who turned to her.

"It's not mine. I- she's trying to frame me." Clockwise, she turned to Blake in desperation. "Please, you know how the authorities operate. This is just a peaceful protest! No one has any intention of causing harm."

' _ **Another lie.'**_

The dark-haired huntress and her sister were obviously conflicted whereas Ruby herself was simply confused. Taking a mental step back from the conversation, she let the increasingly serious interrogation pass overhead while trying to focus on the instinct speaking to her.

"I know how most of my colleagues operate," Winter interjected before anyone could form further opinion, "And I know I personally haven't given you much of a reason to trust me, but I can promise you that I will not hold this infraction against you. My only concern is the safety of my Kingdom and its people. So if you know anything about a possible terror action, I implore you to tell us about it now."

Ruby watched the back and forth in mute silence, reading faces like closed captioning.

"I know who you are," Another step backwards brought the timid rabbit into the waiting arms of Yang who held her almost protectively. "You're Winter Schnee. You'll kill me if I don't say anything, won't you? But I swear, I don't know anything!"

Winter was very honestly taken aback by the accusation. But before she could defend herself, she was interrupted by another.

"You're lying."

This time, it was the Faunus's turn to be surprised. Turning to the innocent-looking girl who had until this point been defending her, the woman's pupils dilated, and heart fluttered like a snare. Ruby could feel it happen, that very _real_ pang of fear.

"N-no, I promise-"

"Don't." Ruby's voice suddenly turned cold at the same time the spring chill melted around them. "-Just tell the truth."

Her teammates had the same brand of surprise on their face as their captive, but they still had innate trust in their leader. The Faunus herself felt compelled by this foreign command, her mouth parting involuntarily and ready to spill all her secrets.

It turned into a sneer.

"Well, crap."

Just as the truth was closing in, the rabbit Faunus hopped into the air and shot her legs out to give herself room. Both feet caught Ruby square on in the chest and at the same time shot the rabbit Faunus backwards, plowing both her and Yang into the adjacent brick wall. The latter getting the wind knocked out of her as the Faunus leapt off her ample chest and towards the nearest roof.

Somehow only skidding back a few paces, Ruby saw the escape attempt and shot into the air to intercept. She flew past a stunned Winter who was incredulous at suddenly being proven right.

But her reverie was quickly shrugged as Ruby hurled the fugitive at her feet with an audible smack that broke the spell and roused her to action. Winter cast a spell of her own, pinning the Faunus to the frozen concrete with a restraining glyph invoked without thought.

"Fine! You want the truth?!" Seeing that she wasn't going to escape the gravity keeping her prostrate against the ground, the suspect White Fang chose to hurl words at them instead. "You're already too late Schnee, if you think you can undo the years of mistreatment suffered at the hands of Atlas and your family! And you little whores, selling yourself to these monsters- you were _born_ too late!"

Giving herself to the inevitable, the Faunus ceased her struggling and regarded the four surrounding her with an ugly look that was so out of place on her button-like face.

"What is the White Fang planning here?" Seized by the sudden stillness, Blake knelt next to her countrywoman and half demanded, half implored. "Please, tell me. It **isn't** too late- not yet."

"You're wrong about that," Laid out in front of the feline huntress should have made the other woman quaver in fear. But all that showed was contempt. "You know, I might've actually felt pity for you. Growing up in the homeland and then Vale, you might have truly believed that there was a future for our kind in the world of man. But from what Taurus told us, you're just a privileged little minx who thinks she knows what's best for all of us- just like your deluded father."

"W-what?" Where the woman's only weapons were her sharp teeth, she struck a critical blow against Blake and made her recoil from the acerbic words. "Adam's here?"

Blake chose to latch on to that fact amongst the many disturbing ones uttered in the same breath while Ruby and the others were mostly lost in the conversation. Bookmarking later questions for her teammate, Ruby took her place over the captive.

"We're not our parents." Ruby spoke softly but again, her words seemed to carry more weight than all the blows thus far. "We haven't wronged you, but we're the ones who're going to have to deal with the consequences of whatever happens. Us and many others, most of whom aren't even born yet. It might seem like I don't understand your suffering- and perhaps I can't. But I do know pain. I know the world isn't perfect."

Ruby took a deep breath, remembering the life of that little blond boy whose actions had ramifications even now. She thought of her own life, the choices she made and where they might lead.

"-Not yet. But that doesn't mean we can't try to make it so. We don't have to keep passing down the hatred of our ancestors. We're strong, we can take it upon ourselves so that the no one has to suffer this way ever again."

"Some lessons can only be taught through pain." No longer vindictive, yet a bitterness had aged lines into the woman's young visage. "That strength you proclaim, it was caused by suffering, wasn't it? That's the only way people learn. Humans might think that they're different, but both of us are really nothing more than animals." She smiled wryly at the ironic image this presented. "-And we will **all** suffer greatly before this is over."

Turning to the one who held her captive, Winter had a bead of sweat dripping down her face which was not due to the strain of maintaining the glyph.

"I imagine even a Schnee has a heart." Her smirk was trying to decide whether it was antagonistic or apologetic. "I almost feel sorry for what's going to happen to the sister. But then again, she won't be the only one."

By design or accident, this veiled threat caused Winter's concentration to waver and her hold to be broken. Either way, the Faunus was quick to take advantage of it and scramble away in the blink of an eye. She was undoubtably fast- had probably unlocked her aura and received some training to serve as a runner.

But she was no huntress.

Before that eye could open again, she found herself pinned against the wall with the back of a blade pressed against her jugular and the force of the world pushing down on her shoulders. She looked down the length of that claw-like scythe into the slivered eyes of its wielder, and couldn't decide which was the more intimidating.

" **What have you done with Weiss?** "

Finding some strength, some defiance in the face of discomfort and the pain threatening to crush her, the Faunus gulped and answered.

"I told you, it's already too late."

* * *

"I doubt that I will be of much use to you." Before long, Weiss found herself trussed up and marched before someone she believed was the ringleader. The limo had pulled off on a road that was more mud than dirt and doubled back around, heading for the granaries and storehouses at the outskirts of Atlas. They were empty this early in the Spring- filled instead with what seemed to be every Faunus from the northern continent. "My father and I aren't on the best of terms. You might get a ransom as long as it isn't too exorbitant. But if you want concessions made for the Faunus workers, you're better off having me as an advocate rather than a hostage."

In all honesty, Weiss wasn't sure it would matter either way. Her words meant little to the CEO of their family's company, and she suspected her life as his daughter was worth even less.

"I wouldn't sell yourself short, my lady." The voice behind the machine intoned- thought from what she'd seen thus far, he was little different in person. As robotic as before, it wasn't even the standard White Fang disguise that hid his expression. Rather, his face appeared to be a mask of flesh set into a permanent look of apathy. "You are more than a personage or a mere name. I have a far more useful purpose for you."

Weiss frowned for the first time since her entrapment. If it had been anyone else telling her this, she might have been delighted to be distinguished from her infamous family. But beyond the circumstances, there was something in the redhead's voice which did not bode well.

"You will make yourself a target long before then." She wouldn't be surprised if someone had noticed her disappearance, and that there was already a plan in place to rescue her. Though this did more to make her nervous than reassure her given of the veritable army of White Fang occupying those storehouses. "You do anything public, and you'll have the Atlas military coming down on your heads. You know that they don't negotiate with terrorists."

But by far, what unnerved her the most was the fact that there were currently none of those armed Faunus to be seen. It was just her and their leader- the one professing to be Adam Taurus. And his sudden, self-assured smile only furthered this awful feeling of foreboding.

"Of course. That is the idea."

She felt cold. Growing up in the sub-zero climate of Atlas, Weiss never felt cold. But now her blood congealed in her veins and her heart choked on the thick sludge.

"What are you saying?" Not even sure she really wanted to know, any of the various scenarios were equally unthinkable. "Do you know how many of your people will die? Even with how many are here- you're going to start a war!"

The answer was out of her mouth before it even registered as a possibility in her mind. She fell to her knees, still with her hands tied behind her back as she dipped her head to the floor.

"You're going to start a war. But you can't win. There's no way. It'll be a massacre. Don't you realize that?"

"Yes, it will."

With shock and horror she went rigid, gaping up at the supposed leader of the Faunus with any such rebuttal caught in her throat.

"They're your own people!" The shrill sound ripped past the blockage and tore at her esophagus. She prayed that her cry would carry to someone outside that little office space- she prayed that there was someone outside to listen and believe her.

"They are my puppets." Cocking his head to look at her, his face twisted itself so that it resembled amusement. "Some of them, literally. The others will soon follow. But for the near future, you shall be my most useful tool, my lady.

"The White Fang can incite violence well enough on their own. It doesn't take much here in Atlas, does it? And with the current upheaval, all one needs is the pretense of a threat against the government and the spark might catch on its own.

"…But why take that chance when I have firecracker right here in my hands?"

He paused in thought as if asking himself this rhetorical question. Then he chuckled, a tidbit of emotion at long last. But it was a joke that the living wouldn't understand. "You know… a long time ago, I had a debate with my partner about the nature of art. I am chagrinned to admit that it took me this long to finally understand… art can be a blast."

"You're mad." Weiss was embarrassed that it took her this long to figure out. But she didn't have time for embarrassment, she needed to find an escape. Trying to reason her way out proved impossible, and she turned to the only option she had left. "-And you're especially insane if you think I'll be your little pawn!"

"Perhaps I am. But the fact is that you don't have a choice."

This self-assured statement further roused her indignation. Why? Because he dared try and control her. That was what her _father_ had tried to do. She had rebelled against him, run away. She could run away from this too.

"-Don't think that I need you to be alive to use you."

Weiss's teeth snapped down on each other instead of her tongue as the man took even this option away from her. She would have even thanked him for reminding her of her rational- except that she would rather die than thank him.

"In fact, you would be doubtlessly easier to manage. Quiet, for one. I also wouldn't have to drag you along; I could just leave you here. Imagine the devastation of the rescue team as they arrive heroically only to find your cooling corpse. Or perhaps I should string out the torment for months, make it public sensation with body parts left all over the city? That should be enough of a scandal for a man such as Jacques Schnee to rile him to action. I dare say the General himself would be forced to get involved.

"Ah, but that is too crude. Too quick, and frankly, unbecoming for a beautiful doll such as yourself. I think it would be far more tasteful if you were to become a turncoat. Picture it: the heiress of Faunus kind's worst enemies leading the rebellion against her own family. What could be more devastating to a man who thought he controlled the world? Not to mention your friends when they find out you betrayed them. It might even be enough to throw Uzumaki off his game…"

"You're a shinobi." This fact clicked into place and finally got the rest of her gears turning. But what emerged seemed even more hopeless than before.

"Of course," 'Adam Taurus' cocked his head somewhere halfway between curiosity and bemusement, like he didn't know what to do with it. "Didn't I mention that?"

"There seemed to have been something lost in translation during our 'introduction'." Weiss practically spat, reluctantly playing into what she felt was a game.

"Oh, right. I suppose I forget that I don't have as many puppets up here as I did in Vale." As he turned to face her stiffly, Weiss was once again given the impression of an inanimate object, of someone pulling the strings in the rafters. "Shame. this one has been useful, if not a little conspicuous. It was too easy for those close to him to realize that 'Adam Taurus' was acting strangely and well… after my cover there was blown, there weren't enough forces left to join in the attack on Vale."

Shrugging indifferently, he left Weiss to infer the rest. Though she wasn't about to shed any tears for a gaggle of dead terrorists. And besides, she wasn't even sure she had the ability to be horrified any longer.

"Oh well. In the end, I suppose it was a good thing since it allowed me to follow the General's retreat and make my way here. The Atlesian Knights and Paladins are truly incredible, aren't they? Even if they are mass produced, they are true works of art. Tireless soldiers, stainless, unflinching.

"-But they will be nothing in comparison to what I will craft once I get my hands on the technology. What do you say, my lady? You could become my masterpiece. I have formulated theories about how to preserve Semblances, and what better one to try than the infamous Schnee Hereditary Glyphs?"

Her revulsion was too much to hide even if she wanted to. Allegories about tools and puppets had suddenly become disturbingly literal. With every answer she received, the immanence and reality of the situation sunk in and she realized that she _**needed**_ to escape.

"Don't be so quick to refuse my offer. Think about it, I could make you immortal. Invincible. In one fell swoop you could become stronger than your sister, overthrow your tyrannical father. You could even keep your sense of self. I can do that for you. It would be better than simply being my pawn, wouldn't it?"

"That wouldn't exactly be a smart move on your part." Weiss snarled, trying to focus on the seemingly ludicrous argument. Trying to focus on the diversity of objects in the room, their potential uses, the number of exists, the type of restraints, the state of her Aura, the capability of her abductor, the chance of escape and the likelihood that the waiting White Fang wouldn't just gut her the moment she was out of her bonds. "What makes you think I'll remain beholden to you if you give me this 'gift'?"

"No… I suppose it wouldn't be such a great idea. More of a whim, rather. A Risky one." Forgetting himself once again, the one masquerading as Adam Taurus turned to the blank wall and stared through it as if it were a window. "A remnant of human fallacy. I suppose I still have that, even after all this time."

He seemed distracted by this, disturbed. Maybe he was contemplating his goal, with the end being so close in sight. If Atlas were to fall, the rest of the Remnant would not be far behind. And after that? What was his purpose in conquering humanity and Faunus if only to turn them into unthinking dolls with lifelike faces? What was perfection? He had lived a reality without anyone to argue this with him, and he had found it even more intolerable than his partnership with Diedera, eons ago. Now there was a thought. Maybe he had gone mad, and there would be no one to say otherwise.

But Weiss didn't consider any of this.

"THEN YOU CAN TAKE IT TO HELL WITH YOU!"

It shot over her shoulder with a cold wind, whisking her hair which had fallen out of its tight ponytail and giving her the barest of nicks on her cheek. Right under the scar it had also given her.

But the Atlesian Knight she had summoned did far more damage to its intended target. That selfsame blue eye stared down the length of the crystalline blade as it impaled the imposter through the sternum.

Having no time to be impressed with her accomplishment and before it disappeared, Weiss cut her bonds on the extended blade and massaged her stiff wrists. Busy assessing her combat worth, she paused as the disembodied arm and sword fell away in a flurry of snowflakes that defied gravity. She watched the body as it slumped over against the far wall, nonplus nowhere to be found on its waxen face.

Now all she had to do was-

"Mr. Taurus! We heard a noise, is something the mat-?"

Weiss and the intruding Faunus were both caught in the middle of thought, staring at each other with wide eyes and mouths agape as they each prepared to say something that would bring action to this freezeframe.

"And it's a wonder that I prefer inanimate objects…"

"Mr. Taurus, are you alri-"

The Faunus guard was the first and last of them to speak. From his open mouth, the only other thing that emerged was a needlepoint blade.

"Perfectly fine, thank you."

Defying his wounds and all logic, 'Adam' stood up and brushed himself off, ignoring the limp body which fell to reveal another White Fang foot soldier that had been standing behind the first.

-Except that Weiss greatly suspected that like the Bull Faunus, they were not what they appeared to be. She didn't even think that it was a 'they' anymore, much less a Faunus or living being. Her first hint was the summary betrayal of their supposed comrade. The second being the mechanical whir of gears as the blade retracted into their throat and the dislocated jaw snapped shut.

"Although, I greatly dislike being interrupted." He looked at Weiss with the same bland expression, not even bearing the annoyance that he proclaimed. "I trust you understand now what awaits if you irritate me."

"Then I can only hope you don't hold this against me."

Even given this warning, the puppet master could do nothing with his marionette as it was blown back by a glyph which occupied the doorway. Weiss soon followed, snatching up the fallen Faunus's sword on her way out of the office.

Her fluid movement came to a skittering halt the moment she set one foot into the storehouse proper. Dark though it was, she could see the lines of white-masked figures packed side by side like teeth in a grin, and she was sure they could see her as well.

"Crud."

It was just a whisper, but there was no doubt they heard her as the darkness answered back with its own cacophony of noise. The ringing of blades being unsheathed, racking of shotguns and the cracking of knuckles which might bear claws sharper than the second-hand katana in her hand.

And behind her, the sounds of the maestro's deliberate footsteps clacking towards her. There was no way she was getting out of this alive. Not by herself.

"Someone, help me!"

Flummoxed by this plea, several of the White Fang looked at one another as they decided whether to refuse, scratch their heads, laugh, or just gut her. She decided to give them a hand.

"This man is not your leader! This is not Adam Taurus!" Moving attention away from herself, she stepped from the doorway and pointed at the lackadaisical redhead who stepped forth into the dim light. "He wants to destroy you, and he's going to use me as the tool for your demise!"

While it was clear by the audible growls, there were none too few that didn't believe her- not that she could blame them. But along with the preexistent animosities, there had also been those who doubted their new leader. And Weiss's confession took advantage of their mistrust.

"Interesting gambit." 'Adam' commended, staring back at the number of faces which regarded him with suspicion. "But this time, you lose."

An explosion shattered the farthest wall, fire casting dancing shadow puppets on the wall and across her waxen skin. Any and all attention that had been on the escaped fugitive was immediately directed over there.

"The military's attacking!"

No one could be sure where the first cry came from. But it was soon joined by multitudes of others screaming any number of derogatory slurs, harried commands and exclamations of glory. This chain reaction polarized any of the contention between Faunus and destroyed the quantum chance Weiss had of swaying some to her side.

But even as the forces cleared out to deal with the intruders, several scores of White Fang remained stock still like terracotta warriors guarding her tomb.

"Like dogs chasing a squirrel. It would be disappointing, if it weren't so amusing." Not behaving in the least bit amused, the imposter wasn't looking anywhere but her even as the sounds of battle and chaos waged around them in the darkness. "So how does it feel to know that they are fighting and dying over you? Granted, I am sure quite a few would rather see you dead as well. But history will remember the final battle and say that it was sparked from a woman. It tends to be romantic like that."

There was nothing romantic about this that Weiss could see. Just a simple reality, barbaric, stilted, short, and solitary. She would have really liked for her team to be here. She was even beginning to miss that quiescent presence in the back of her mind. He never needed to speak, but it would have been nice to hear his voice one last time.

Why? Because Shino would probably have chided her for her foolishness, reminding her not to give up until the very end.

Like this thought, it came crashing in. Whatever it was, interrupting her nihilism and tossing several of the White Fang automaton over their heads whereupon they were dashed against the far wall. As the spray of gears clattered against the floor and the oil slowly dripped, the figure rose to greet them.

Weiss was shocked. Not only for her deliverance, but for the first true emotion she glimpsed manifested on the shinobi's borrowed visage. A twinge of surprise, then annoyance as he recalled the rest of his mechanical army into a defensive ring around him.

"How annoying."

Even if he was as undead as he claimed to be, Weiss had no idea how the man could still be so calm in the situation. Her own rational and bearings had been scattered like cockroaches in the lamplight as she stared upon this brilliant figure.

The Aura which surrounded them was unlike anything Weiss had ever seen- yet at the same time, somehow as familiar as the person who wore it. Although, it still took her a little while to recognize who it was under that cloak of crimson fire. She was deceived, not only by the primordial power which cast both light and shadow on every corner, but the ferocious snarl which occupied her innocent visage.

"Ruby?" Weiss rasped. The little girl had stolen her breath from her and used it to fuel the flames, transforming her into a beast.

" _ **LET HER GO!"**_ Heedless of her whisper, Weiss's partner growled with fangs bared at her kidnapper.

"How annoying," However, the shinobi was all but unaffected, almost as if he'd seen it before. "But I suppose, predictable. You weren't supposed to be here, Kyuubi. But then again, when has logic kept the story from repeating itself?"

Ruby replied with a primal yell that nearly whisked Weiss off her feet and tore the sheet-metal walls from their buttresses. White as a sheet, she was once again forced herself to assess her options, only to find that the list had shrunken.

"After all, none of us are in control here."


	22. Today and Tomorrow

When he slept, it was the deep, halcyon sleep of a man unburdened from the troubles of life. Beholden to nothing and nobody anymore, he had no outstanding debts, no regrets, and most importantly, leaving no one to mourn him.

However, he did dream. The only kind of dream someone with no desires and no guilt ought to have. One where the world had moved on from his life unaware of it, yet just that tiny bit better for his having been there. It was a good dream.

Therefore, like all good things, it had to come to an end.

Which was for the best, really. Because even though it was a perfect world he dreamed of, it left him discontent and restless in his grave. He grew hungry as the poor were fed, himself unable to be sated and without even the stomach for the sensation. Frolicking jubilations left him weary while he lay there, unmoving. It made him frustrated as everything went right without a single person having to lift a finger, and he wanted to weep with eyes that he thought he had closed for good.

No, this wasn't a perfect world. Not yet.

Therefore, he couldn't afford to rest. Not yet.

Awakening was a process, one which seemed to take hours but in truth, took weeks. Reality blurred into his restive sleep- literally and figuratively as his glasses had been misplaced somewhere between here and the afterlife.

That, and the scene which greeted him every time he pried open his eyes was every bit as perfect as his world of slumber: palm trees swayed above him with blue skies beyond. And there was clean, softly weathered quartz sand to serve as his pillow. It soaked in the heat during the day, and at night soothed his broken body which was coming to life even slower than he was. Everything was like a picture out of a postcard- and it disgusted him.

Except for her. The only thing to eclipse his tropical paradise as she gently fed him coconut milk and later, a rich, salty paste which somehow reminded him of marzipan and blood sausage at the same time (he really would have preferred a nice, strong cup of coffee over all of it). Even without his corrective eyewear he could tell she was perfect too. Doll-like with her beauty and complexion, and orange hair such that it must have been painted that way in a children's storybook.

And yet- he couldn't blame her. Not for her manufactured looks nor her textbook ministrations of his invalid body.

"The fractures in your right leg and hand are healing up well after I was able to reset them," In her default chipper voice, she recited the progress of his injuries as she examined and redressed them. Listening to her yammer on with his eyes closed, he wondered if she was just saying these things to stave off the loneliness, or if she somehow knew he was awake. He also wondered if this blithely chipper voice was also what haunted him in his eternal rest.

"Oh, how wonderful! It appears that your wounds are not festering!" Lovely. His eye twitched- though he was unsure if it was because of the clueless attitude, or the pain she was inadvertently causing him. "There was some… concern after performing the amputation."

Then there were moments like these that he wished he had the strength to get up and stand on his own- or hobble, rather. Anything to hammer home the point that none of it was her fault, that he should be grateful simply to be alive after being buried under several million tons of rock- although, he frankly wasn't. Death had been a vacation. If he was alive, there was work to be done.

"Despite the fact that I was unable to save your leg, it truly is incredible that you survived," Practically reading his thoughts, though he fathomed there wasn't much else to think about on that isolated slice of heaven. "With your sub-par physiology, non-huntsman fitness levels and sluggish immune system, there was an 87% chance that even with surviving the initial blast and cave-in, you would have succumbed to sepsis within the first few days after I rescued you." With an extra bit of pride in her own handiwork, she finished wrapping his stump of a leg like one would a birthday present. "-Either that or respiratory complications from the mineral particulate and anoxic environment. -Ooh, or a blood clot from inactivity while trapped underground, or-"

As she listed the numerous ways he could have perished, his single thought was not how he survived or even why, only if it was worth it if he had to put up with any more of this.

"…I guess… some might call it a miracle that you made it out." A hand touched him gently on the shoulder, a place where he only had a bruise and where he could feel that delicate appendage like a hammer strike. "There are no records of someone your age unlocking their Aura- let alone Semblance."

Was it a miracle? He supposed it might have looked that way from her perspective, being in the right place to find him. Apart from the total lack of Grimm, what was this this strange little girl doing there so far from civilization? What were the odds that she should be able to not only locate him, but excavate his mangled corpse and drag it from the depths of hell?

Maybe he wanted to ask, and maybe he would even get an answer from this miraculous little angel. Then again, he was alive, so what did it matter?

"I calculate that within a few more days, your fractures will be healed enough that you will be able to put weight on them." Like that hand, she spoke gently but deliberately. Every action was calculated- there was no room for chance and miracles, oh no. "I have already fashioned you a crutch for ease of mobility and a raft for our transport. Once we reach the mainland, I will be able to arrange for more reliable means of transportation and a suitable prosthetic."

Okay, so she did know he was awake. That left a whole bunch of other questions, some of which were probably moot, and some which he was absolutely certain he didn't want answers to but was probably going to be enlightened, anyway.

Cracking through the layers of sand that had accumulated in slumber, he squinted at her in disdain. Actually, it was more so he could get a better look at her, and it just so happened that he was in constant pain. Through those slit apertures, he could almost see a spattering of freckles being pinched by a drawn-on smile.

"What's the rush?" He creaked out, for once wishing for more of the coconut milk. He was surprised she hadn't predicted that.

The living doll appeared surprised too, cocking her head in a manner that was like clockwork.

"I-I thought that well- everyone has things they need to do. Don't they?" Contradicting her automation was this doubt, manifested by removing her hand from his shoulder and nibbling on her thumb in a way that was so lifelike it was unnerving.

"Perhaps," His first instinct was to laugh, but that seemed to him somehow sacrilegious. That, and he hurt too much. "But… only what meaning we allow ourselves. Like how we give our weapons names, or dolls a human face."

Sitting up he knew would be a bad idea. But he did it anyway, getting most of the way before something stabbed him in the chest and let out all the air in his lungs. The instinctive response only brought more pain as he spasmed and jostled his other wounds. He wanted to cry out, lay back down and die for a second time, but something prevented him.

For one, there was no breath for a cry. And two, there was a slim but immutable arm holding him in a semi-reclined state.

"Let me guess, fractured rib?" He wheezed, looking over at the face hovering right next to him.

"Three, actually." With her so close he could finally see her smile clearly, see that it wasn't entirely naïve to suffering. "One of which punctured your lung. But your Aura mostly healed the tear after the first few days."

"Mostly…" He grumbled, trying not to stir anything else loose.

"Yes. Please try not to aggravate it." A slight hint of disapproval marred the otherwise clinical advice, and he suspected she would actually be annoyed if he managed to undo all her hard work. "Do you wish to try and stand, or would you prefer to postpone rehabilitation?"

With his head and body all kinds of messed-up, he rightfully didn't know. On one hand, he needed rest. On the other (which only had three workable fingers), the sooner he could stand, the sooner he could take on whatever he had been resurrected to do.

"It feels awful, doesn't it?" He asked while the hand made mechanical circles on his back.

"Are you in pain? I am sorry, but there are no compounds with which I can synthesize any painkillers."

"I'm not talking about that," Though he was in excruciating agony, it was not this which roused him from eternal slumber. "I mean the burden of making a choice."

Hitherto there was a perfectly timed pause, and then with a nod and pneumatic precision, she laid him back down where he continued to scowl up at the perfectly blue sky. "Perhaps… we should take things slowly."

Eyes closed after his ordeal, he nodded in shallow agreement.

"My name's Penny. Penny Polendina. May I ask, what is yours?"

There he was given a choice, knowing almost certainly that Ozpin's little side-experiment was aware of exactly who he was. Rescuing and resuscitating him hadn't been a courtesy, but a mission. Her- _it's_ purpose in being there.

"Bruno." He sighed with what little air he could gather between sharp breaths. "Just, Bruno."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Bruno."

Even though his eyes were closed, he somehow knew she was beaming a smile down on him that was every bit as luminescent as the sun. Somehow, he knew she meant it.

* * *

While it might not have been something to be proud of, Ruby could safely say that she was accustomed to hearing voices in her head. It had become normal for the girl, like fighting soulless monsters or having a sister who was not from the same mother. And like her sister, she longed for that constant and loyal presence, feeling incomplete without it.

It was a desire which Ruby herself was mostly unaware of. Just like she was unaware of when that voice ever-so-naturally slipped back into her life, sneaking in on the back of instinct and hiding in the shadow of doubt. She was ignorant to what stirred in the dark recesses of her mind, the creature she awakened with her silent siren calls.

-But it wouldn't have come if she hadn't been subconsciously looking for it. And it never registered as strange or wrong or wicked because it was…

Familiar.

"Who're you again?" Ambivalent towards an answer, Ruby stretched lazily and burrowed back into the mat of short hairs which felt like recently mown grass. "I feel like… I should know you."

An earthquake hummed in contemplation underneath her, but Ruby did not stir. She did not want to wake form this dream.

" **Perhaps. Have you ever heard the story of the Big Bad Wolf?"** Huge, hungry eyes stared down at the red-cloaked girl reclining on the ridge of its equally-large snout.

"You're not a wolf, silly." Drinking in the scent with her nose in its fur, it smelled of spice and wood, ash and earth, and something else reminiscent which was yet on the tip of her tongue.

" **Oh no?"** Teeth the size of that scythe she liked to tote around stretched into a smile. **"Then what am I, Ms. Smarty-pants?"**

"I'za combat skirt…" Groaning, Ruby restlessly tried to find the position she'd been so comfortable in before and was now unable to return to. "-And you're a fuzzy fluffy whatsit, like a big Zwei…"

The fluff seeming to trap incalculable amounts heat, Ruby realized that she was no longer comfortably warm but swelteringly hot. Though almost as soon as she had this thought, she felt the breeze kick up and rush by her skin, cooling her. And almost immediately afterwards, she splashed down and was quenched with stagnant water which still smelled like fresh rain.

"-Hey!" She spluttered, fighting her drenched cape as she glared up at the smirk which could swallow her whole. "What was that for?"

" **It's time to wake up."** Mirth fading with ever word, each syllable awakened Ruby to the strange reality she found herself in.

"Wait…" Slowly she rose until she was shin-deep in the reflective pool, surveying slowly the mystic trappings of the chamber- _Everything_ she was doing felt so maddeningly slow, especially thinking. Eventually she came back to the gigantic beast which waited on her with the serenity of a mountain, and she tried to place where she had seen it before. "I know this place… I know **you** "

Yes, the creature nodded, she had known it all her life. Though she had forgotten that she had died once before, and forgotten a great many things in that thieving slumber.

"You're… a fox." Something between a cat and a dog, between a Blake and a Zwei- thought with something extra thrown in. "A nine-tailed fox…"

" _ **The**_ **Nine-Tailed Fox,"** Pride slipping through, letting her know it was not a god, but something else. **"Kyῡbi no Yōkō, king of Kitsune. But this is just a title. Though we have not been introduced yet, I know you, Ruby Rose. And in turn, you may call me… Kurama."**

And then she remembered.

"You-you're Naruto's Demon!" There was no malice in this accusation, and the only fear came with her onslaught of urgent questions. "Then that means- wait, where's Naruto? Where am I? Why are you here? Why am **I** here?" Hands shot to her head to try and stem the information that seemed to be flowing out of it. "What is going on?!"

Patient throughout her rant, Kurama allowed himself a nostalgic smile towards the new girl, the same old scenario repeated time and again.

" **Simple** ," His eyes glowed like Fire-Dust as they leered down at her. They reminded Ruby of Naruto's prison, and of the ossified crystal in her body which had been threatening to kill her. **"I am a part of you, now."**

Looking down at her hands, she remembered her bones turning to Dust and the throbbing, pulsating, _aching_ power which resided within. She remembered the voice both reassuring and maleficent whispering truth and lies to her. She remembered the unbridled **rage** when she learned of the threat to her partner. It was a burning, voracious emotion which she discovered she couldn't control once let off the reins.

She remembered that she was on fire.

Ruby screamed as she was consumed from the inside out.

" **You have to wake up!"**

* * *

"Wake up, wake up, wake up…"

Weiss chanted to herself. Or maybe she hoped to reach the hunchbacked form of her partner who was tearing apart the windup army like a mad beast. Or perhaps even to the puppets themselves, for all it was worth.

In any way, her words were useless. This was no hallucination, and her young captain was deaf to her pleas. Shino would probably chide her for being so irrational. **If** she survived, that is.

-No. Again, being illogical. If she wanted to survive, she had to fight for it. And Ruby wasn't too far gone just yet. She had come for Weiss, after all. Therefore, it was only right she do the same. She needed some way of reaching the girl.

This proved less of a problem than anticipated, as Ruby was suddenly right in front of her. And being so close, Weiss was forced to doubt whether this truly was the captain she had come to know and tolerate. Her snarling visage and inflamed eyes were more befitting of a Grimm, and the tangible Aura which surrounded her was unrestrained and volatile like atomized Dust.

Weiss had a flashback to the first day they met, the fiery explosion consuming her as history repeated itself.

"Weiss!"

She froze- Weiss figuratively and Ruby literally as the fires on her right side were suddenly swallowed by a Beowulf made of blue ice. Faster than a popsicle in summer it melted under the unquenchable fires, but the beastly collision sent the possessed Ruby tumbling away from her stunned partner. And before either girl could figure out what happened, more puppets surrounded Ruby and blocked off the crimson glow.

"Weiss, are you alright?" Not sure how to answer that question, the student huntress looked to see who was asking only to be enveloped by another one of Winter's unaccustomed hugs. "I'm here. Thank God I made it."

"Winter-" Fighting against the desperate embrace and her own false sense of security within, Weiss broke free and dragged them both down just in time to avoid the carelessly tossed remains of a julienned marionette. Tracing its flightpath, they saw that Ruby had managed to whittle down the enemy numbers to less than half a dozen. But those five were proving more resilient than the rest, almost as if they were designed in advance to resist the caustic energy cloak. "-Just **what** is going on?"

Opening her mouth, Winter wanted to say she didn't know, to say that the unassuming girl had just taken off in a rage once she learned her partner was in trouble. Instead, something else instead pressed itself to the forefront of Winter's mind.

"A demon…" Weiss looked at her sister as the elder blinked slowly in self-scrutiny. With each frame, an illuminated imagine came into focus. There had been a drawing with fur of cinnabar and glittering claws of gold leaf. Along with the picture came a formal title, penned in ink which hadn't faded a day in centuries. "No… a Kitsune."

"First of all, what's that? And second, how do you know?"

That answer lay in a stack of books, in a cardboard building, on an island shrouded in fog, in a time and place long ago. Hints had been given, clues to a mystery. And every step of the way, the scent of cardamom coaxing her along.

"A friend." Winter allowed herself a moment of sadness, another for anger, before she buried her regrets. "We're dealing with ancient forces here. Something out of my pay grade, and I'm frankly not sure how to proceed. Following Ruby and finding you were my first and only priorities. I had your other teammates stay behind to keep an eye on things, and hopefully wrangle us some backup."

Both sisters had their doubts, but these had nothing to do with the primordial nature of their issue. By now, they had dealt with the incredible. It was only the unreliability of humans which continued to disappoint them.

"The red-haired one, no matter who he looks like, he's really a shinobi."

Nodding grimly, Winter wondered if they could just let the berserker huntress deal with the undead menace. But then that left the question of what Ruby would do after that threat was eliminated. It was an issue that was fast approaching, as the girl had managed to find some way around the specialized puppets' abilities and was even then mopping the floor with the last of them.

That still left the imitation Adam Taurus, as unflappable as ever even amongst the littered remains of his mechanical servants.

"Very efficient." The redhead smiled. One that was too rueful and too practiced to be seen on such a young face. "Grimm, puppets, terrorists… I wonder what's next? I have no doubt you have the power to destroy me. But do say, what will you do after? Will it be your 'friends'? Remnant? Go ahead and cleanse the rest of this festering world, and then I can seal the wound so it doesn't come back."

Unconscious to the villain's monologue, Ruby took one, thundering step forward, the wooden skull of a puppet crunching underneath her boot.

The whole building shook.

While most of them including the feral girl scanned the surrounding din of the battle for what caused the tremor, Winter merely stood up straight with the surety of knowing that exact sound.

"Ah, good. Backup has arrived."

Underlining this conviction was a long screech of metal as the granary's corrugated walls were peeled back like a sardine can and sunlight spilled in to the darkness. Silhouetted in that tear was the mirrored outline of two mass-production Paladins. And between their mammoth feet, a mechanized stream of AK-200's poured in.

"Funny," Undisturbed by this massive shift in the tide of battle, 'Adam' raised his hands as if in surrender but stopped midway to let his fingers dangle. "I was just about to say the same thing."

Not even being allowed false hope, the two columns of robotic knights instantly diverged to surround the Schnee sisters and Ruby. The latter made to swipe at the influx with another tail which had only then sprouted. But she just as soon collapsed as she turned around and was enveloped by the mechanized tide.

"Ruby!" Heedless to their own predicament, Wiess called out and tried to press through the automated wall. Very quickly discovering the futility, she was beaten back by the unsympathetic machines and then pulled in tight by her sister against the tightening noose. "Winter, what in Remnant is going on?!"

"I think it's safe to say that nothing is going right today." Winter growled as she brandished her saber nigh-impotently against the unflinching soldiers encircling them.

"And I would say it's a matter of perspective." The-man-who-was-not spoke out over the mob. "One after another, pieces are falling into place. The computer virus- the _Trojan_ , I believe they call it, provided by Cinder's faction works perfectly- after a little modification. Admittedly, it would have taken me quite a while to catch up on modern technologies otherwise, but this has proven to be a windfall."

There was nothing overtly menacing about the AK units- that is to say, nothing appeared wrong in their operation from the layman's eye, and that is what was most disturbing. They were simply tools carrying out their function, and Weiss and Winter were but nails to be tacked down.

"Good for you. Now you have them, now you have _us._ What do you plan to do?" Planning herself, Winter tried to pretend like she didn't already know the unsavory possibilities.

"I already informed your sister, and she was less than enticed by the options I presented." Back to back now, Winter looked over her shoulder and met her sibling's eye. Both silently agreed to keep it amongst themselves. "Willing or not, having you as hostages will be useful to attract more military units. The larger this conflict grows, the more materials will fall into my hands. Soon I will have the army I used to. After that, who knows? In another life, another time, I might have been content just to exist alone and perfect my art with this wonderful technology your cycle has developed. But from here, it would be so easy to take over your Kingdom-nay, your entire world. And then I wouldn't have to worry ever again. Unlimited resources, unlimited potential…

"Regardless, I intend to keep you alive, for now. Your influence on the Kyῡbi Jinchῡriki is keeping her conflicted and thus easier to deal with. Being able to reflect on Pain's plan, I have had some of my own ideas on how to use the Tailed beasts. And now, nothing but time to try them."

"Damn you," Consternated by her apparent uselessness, Winter's frustration was heightened by the confusion and madness which surrounded this farce. And the fact that she could almost understand it only made it worse. "I will not be used as a tool for my own nation's demise! I swear I will-!"

"-When will you creatures quit lying to yourselves?!" Anger, true upset parted the metal tide to reveal the poser with a genuine expression trying to escape from his fabricated face. "It's always the same: For your country, for your family, for your friends- when the truth is that it's only ever about yourselves. Organic life itself is a selfish act, one constantly doomed to failure. You strip the world around you from its resources- its very essence. Do you know how many times I have had to watch life grow and flourish, only to know that it inevitably collapses under its own weight? Each time, it takes the world longer to recover. It becomes harder to hide the scars of civilization."

"What are you saying?" Though it was Winter who brandished her weapon, it was Weiss who dared ask the question and take a tentative step towards the ancient being. "That… there were others- besides the shinobi?"

"If all my people were locked away in Dust," 'Adam' removed his mask so they could look at his very _human_ smirk. "Where, then, did you come from?"

In all their time spent with the sentient crystals, none had deigned ask this question. Had it occurred to them, and they just never bothered to ask? Or had they simply assumed that the knowledge was forever locked away, like their immutable partners? Now it seemed, both were coming out at long last.

"All this talk about fate," For all that his eyes mimicked glass, talking about this subject made the puppeteer look weary. "Life always comes back. Somehow, someway. And it never changes. I might not have been around for all of it, but I was aware. I could feel their presence, their pain, their self-destruction. And the remnants are there, if only one were to look."

"Even if we were to believe you," Channeling for the obstinate child whom she could _hear_ simpering right next to them, Weiss stepped forward past her sister's brandished cutlass. "What does that have to do with us? You said yourself that you've never seen technology like ours. What else might we be capable of given time? Whoever came before, we're not them- we're not our ancestors or even our _parents_. The reason we have our myths about the Brother God's isn't because we believe them, but because we believe in that capacity of good and evil in us all. You talk as if you're not a part of this, therefore what right do you have to condemn it?!"

The way she was feeling, Weiss could have torn off the pandering façade of humanity- humanity, because at that moment she no longer recognized the difference between humans and Faunus. Only that between right and wrong, between the living and this poser. Therefore, she didn't attack him. Because she was consciously speaking for both Remnant's species, and all of life besides.

"Why do I know what you are going to do? Because," Noticing her struggle, the one who deigned play god could have ended the argument with a twitch of his lips, a nudge of his pinky. "It is so much easier to destroy than create."

Manifesting this idea was a massive red hand, slapping down where both adversaries had been standing but only managing to crush a dozen AK-200's. With their automated sub-routines still intact, the possessed army swung their guns to the latest threat without prompt from their master. They did this only to receive fire from both sides.

In leu of something with more finesse, Weiss had snatched up one of the robotic soldier's plasma rifles and turned it against them. Meanwhile, Winter was providing close support as the two retreated from the renewed conflict.

Though remiss to do so while her captain was still taking the brunt of the fighting, Weiss at least realized that they could not help Ruby if they were also in the thick of it. Therefore, they had to extricate themselves before they could even think of excising Ruby's demon.

Proving easier said than done, the AK units put up quite the resistance despite being pre-programmed automata. However, advanced hand-to-hand was definitely _not_ supposed to be part of that programming, and Winter suspected that the shinobi was exercising more power than they'd initially given him credit for. The robots' movements were precise and fluid, obviously based on a pattern or style but one Winter did not recognize offhand. Nor did she have the time to analyze it as both Schnee were besieged on all sides.

A downward stroke and the two halves of an AK parted, only to reveal the exploding jab of one behind it. Not daring to close her eyes before the impact, Winter caught the moment its attack halted dead and did not waste a beat taking advantage of it. She beheaded the humanoid machine and slapped its rifle away with the flat of the only pair of civilian shoes she owned. With its own feet planted by her sister's glyph, the unit spun on its ball bearing hips and unleashed a sweeping volley that caught no less than six of its allies in the crossfire.

But only six, as most dodged out of the way with a nimbleness not in their original specs. And so, neither sister had a chance to congratulate themselves while whittling down their numbers.

Seeing that she was reaching the end of her thermal clip, Weiss jabbed the pointed muzzle of her stolen rifle into the gut of another machine with the grace and meticulousness she'd developed from years of fencing with _Myrtenaster_. Leaving the gun to hang there, she snatched her victim's newly-surplussed weapon and recommenced her assault, which at this point was more like a cross between ballet and a biathlon.

Not quite quick enough on her toes though, Weiss found they were swept from underneath her by a Knight sacrificing itself in a desperate tackle. Though desperate was a better descriptor for their own situation, as there was at least another dozen automaton to replace this one after its face was smashed open by Weiss's heel.

One of these disposable soldiers kicked her only weapon out of her hands. But before it could repay the favor she'd done to its brethren, Weiss was whisked away by an unseen conveyor belt on the ground and snatched up once again in her sister's arms.

"Thanks," She gave a chagrinned mutter which might not have been heard amongst the general chaos.

Grunting in confirmation or just general effort, Winter deflected several tightly aimed shots to her head and summoned a glyph to absorb the rest. While they were resting behind the one-way portal, a stampeding heard of Boarbatsuks charged down the firing line of machines.

"I wish I had thought to bring _Myrtenaster_." The eldest chided herself ruefully.

"All we have to do is make it out of here and we can go and get it," Weiss snipped, sniping two AK's which had tried to flank them. "-Along with Blake, Yang, and half Atlas's ground forces if I have to drag them here by myself!"

Her tone of voice ensured that she meant every word. That said, Weiss and Winter both found the promise hollow along with their reserves of Aura and ammunition. They should have noticed earlier, but the AK unit's rifles were draining faster than usual because of the misalignment in Dust. And once disconnected from their frame's power source, that time was even less.

"Crud."

Winter rose an eyebrow at her sister's weak swear, preferring to look at her than what faced them just outside the gaping exit.

"I think that partner of yours has had a bit of an influence on you." With a smirk and a twirl of her cutlass, Winter put herself between Weiss and the Paladins looming just outside. "Personally, I find this more like an "Oh crap," or "Bloody hell" kind of situation."

"And I say the military has made you uncouth." Weiss fired back, snagging another plasma rifle and pointing it at the regrouping machines. "Though perhaps we both have been out of touch with reality."

"Maybe. I do regret trading our tea-time for technical training sessions." Winter conceded with a wry smirk, "But thanks to them, I do know the ins and outs of those Paladins. If I can get one off balance, we can make a break for it."

"You think they're going to let us?" Noticing now that just as many Knights were concentrating fire on them as the rampaging Ruby, Weiss wasn't as confident in their chances.

"I don't know."

Which was funny, if Weiss had time to stop and think about it. For as long as she'd been conscious enough to notice, her sister had had all the answers. It was the reason Weiss followed in her footsteps and out from their father's thumb. And come to think of it, even when taking her own path, she supposed Winter had looked out for her after they parted ways. More than just something to remember her by, that bracelet had been a true, living connection.

She missed Shino. Although, she wasn't entirely sure if it was him, or just the strangeness that he conveyed. While balking at it initially, Weiss had grown accustomed to the wonderful peculiarities which had invaded her life. More than that, she had become addicted to them and the unpredictably novel situations fostered by her team. She had joined Beacon hoping to step out of the ordinary- and by golly she'd got it. She missed Ruby, that oddly naïve, hopeful- just plain _odd_ girl. She missed them all.

Winter's list was a lot shorter, though in the end, she was content knowing that there was one of those names by her side.

Actually, there were two. But she wasn't to know that just yet.

The streaming sunlight winked at her though, hinting its secret. Through the wide rift in the wall a black bolt shot in. Banking from a graceless dive, the raven swerved upwards at the last second in a flurry of frantic wingbeats. In front of their very eyes and within a cascade of falling feathers, the crow transformed into a man who looked no less bedraggled than the bird but infinitely more familiar.

"Qrow!" Winter hurled the word like she hurled a glyph at the attacking force, slamming two AK-200's together. "What in the hell are you doing here?!"

"Uh, saving your ass?" Answering with his own lackadaisical attack, the grizzled hunstman took out another three robot-infantry with a single swing of his broadsword and dodged a hammering strike from the Paladin which was trying to squeeze its way through the gap.

"No, I mean, why are you _**in**_ here when you could be supporting us from somewhere where you're not in the line of fire?!" Falling back into their usual routine, Winter channeled some of her pent-up frustration with the man by tearing off the arm of an unfortunate android and beating the wretched thing to 'death' with it. "And for that matter, where the hell were you?! I thought you were supposed to be shadowing Ruby!"

"Kid's gotten fast," The man mumbled, half in compliment and half in excuse. "Besides, I had a couple of stops to make. Hey, Other Kid, catch."

Exchanging the less-than-flattering address for her weapon, Weiss decided it was a fair trade as she entered the fray with renewed vigor and _Myrtenaster_.

"I hope that's not the limit of your competence." Winter, however, was under no such obligations. "We could really use some heavier firepower."

"Well, I didn't know we'd be facing an army. Just how many of these bastards are there?"

"From the look of things, I'd say the entire Northern Garrison."

"So… an army."

"Did you bring anything else or not?" Trying not to let her desperation show even while struggling underneath the clenched fist of one of the Paladins, Winter was only half-relieved when Qrow swooped in and severed its wrist, thus freeing her to complain. "-I mean, other than your sarcasm and rampant alcoholism?"

"I'll have you know, it's pronounced _conversationalism._ " Producing his flask just to elicit a reaction from the woman, Qrow also flaunted something else between the fingers of his free hand. "Not to mention, the people that wanted to talk to me also gave me something to help with that."

"What is it?" Winter tired to get a better look at the piece of paper the size of old paper-money, but couldn't see much more than an assemblage of inky squiggles before they both had to duck and avoid one of the Paladin's high-yield lasers. Luckily, it hadn't been aiming for them, and merely focused on cutting itself a wider door.

"I'll let you know as soon as I figure it out." Putting the flask away but not the paper, Qrow scanned the dark helter-skelter for something but was interrupted once again by the lumbering Paladin as it managed to sneak a gun-barrel in through the crack. "-And I'd figure it out if I got a moment to do so. Any time now, Freckles!"

"Freckles?"

Hearing nothing but the last bit, Winter was too consumed with the fact that the two Paladins had almost broken through the exterior. Already having peeled back the sheet-metal skin, they were rattling the rebar superstructure like Beringels at a bamboo cage.

And then, they abruptly stopped.

"Directive Override Technique, success."

The voice sounded familiar to Winter. Though with the added hint of satisfaction, she struggled to place it. Exhausted both mentally and physically, the huntress stood there under the shadow of the mechs while watching the equally dark silhouette walk unconcernedly through the arches of their massive legs.

"Penny?"

"Salutations, Lt. Winter!" With a smile that seemed to brighten up the room and deafen the sounds of combat ever so slightly, the android with orange hair and _freckles_ gave her superior officer a wave. "It is fantastic to see you again!"

"What are you- But you're supposed to be- What did you-?"

In contrast to Winter's rapid-fire question and her own normal expression of cluelessness, the artificial girl gave her a single smile that held all the answers.

"I found a new purpose."

If this were not dramatic enough, she drew her arms up like a conductor and let loose four more of her tethered sabers which found targets in an equal number of AK-200's. These units then jerked to the movements of her sweeping hands and turned their guns on their robotic comrades. Soon their volley of fire was joined by the artillery of the Paladins in decimating the remaining enemies.

"I apologize for the delay," Waltzing in with a blithe smile on her face, the gynoid carried out this conversation as if she weren't also carrying out genocide on her fellow machines. "The software hacking technique used was unfamiliar to me, and so I had to devote another 476.8 seconds to devise a workaround. Additionally, once learning of the mission parameters, there were other preparations deemed prudent which I was not able to manage myself."

"She means this," Joining their growing island of calmness, Qrow once again fished the nonsensically inscribed leaflet from his breast pocket and waved it around carelessly.

"And just what the heck is _**that**_ supposed to do?" Likeminded with her sister, Weiss repeated the question as she pirouetted into the conversation.

"From my understanding," Penny paused to release three of her possessed Knights who were on their last legs, finishing them off herself before unsympathetically replacing them with an equal number that had remained on the outskirts of the battle. Thus, turning the flanking maneuver on its head. "It is a talisman constructed for the purpose of absorbing and suppressing the primordial energy source known as Yokai, a caustic derivative of Chakra which was believed to be possessed by-"

"Yeah, yeah, ancient forces, hocus-pocus. Got it. But how does it work?"

"You insufferable bird-brain! I'll plaster it over your mouth if you don't let her finish."

"Actually," Penny interjected, smiling more subtly at Winter's pronoun usage. "It's meant to be applied to the forehead."

"The… forehead?" Qrow and Winter shared a look that didn't have to do with the huntress's death-grip on his collar. "How is that supposed to help? We don't even have this Yo-kai stuff… do we?"

"No," Shaking her head, the other three were struck by the fact that they could suddenly hear the tiny whir of servos in the gynoid's neck as the cavernous building had fallen deathly silent. They watched as Penny raised one of the arms she was using to usurp control of the robotic puppets. Her finger traced a path over the floor which was carpeted with parts and pieces, remains both artificial and organic. "But she does."

Ruby stood alone amongst the carnage which was so dense that not a single sliver of the original concrete could be seen. It would take days to separate the dead from the deactivated, if it were possible at all. There might not be anyone up to the task left by the end of this. As now, devoid of her automated targets, Ruby had turned her sight and fanged snarl their direction.

"So, we just gotta stick this on Kiddo's forehead?" Asking but not really asking, Qrow didn't bother to look and see Penny's shallow nod. "Alright. Any volunteers?"

It might have been a joke, but the two Schnee sisters opted on the safe side and glared at the man who was then currently trying to decide whether he was serious or not. Debating which was more fearsome: the frigid glares or the leer of his niece which wanted to sear him and consume him rare.

"I miss the day when the worst I had to worry about was the Puppy-Dog eyes," Qrow sighed, "Now I have to deal with all these crazy hormonal urges."

"I will do my best to provide support, hedging her movements with the Paladins and remaining Atlesian Knights under my control." Penny consoled.

"And if it makes you feel better," Winter quipped, "I think it's a pretty normal thing to want to tear your face off. Being a teenager nothing to do with it."

Qrow wisely said nothing to this, though perhaps did so for too long and Weiss grew impatient with him. She became intolerant of this whole parody, tragedy, whatever it was. That, and her own perceived uselessness.

"-Hey! Just what do you think you're doing Girl?!"

Once again relying on her sister's advice, she ignored Qrow as she shot past him and snapped up the sealing tag from his hands. Moving too fast for any of the rest to stop her, Weiss flew straight at her captain. But she skidded to a halt as she passed through a veil of invisible vines and into the muggiest jungle she could ever imagine. Despite the sweltering heat, she shivered, for this was something more than mere change in temperature or humidity. The air itself held so much burgeoning anger as to precipitate it onto her skin- into her very thoughts.

"Weiss! Get back here, now!"

They were soon coming after her while Ruby just sat there crouched, waiting, watching her partner who was struggling almost as much as the color in her vulpine stare. A silver blade kept flashing, spilling crimson in those eyes which once held such innocence.

"What am I doing?" Looking at herself, at the flimsy paper tag in her hands, Weiss realized she was shaking. "This isn't me, I'm not this irrational, this stupid." A roar struck her, nearly shaking her off her high-heels and to her knees. But in any case, it tipped the balance. "…This isn't _you_ … Ruby!"

Tipping forward, Weiss was flung by a white glyph stained red by the energy field she waded through. Another one appeared simultaneously underneath Ruby whose concentrated Aura was actively tearing it apart, but it held long enough to keep the girl fixed while her partner closed the distance.

"For once in your life, think, you Dolt!"

Too fast to think, Weiss threw herself away from her initial trajectory as two tail-like streams of energy bled from Ruby and smashed the ground where she had been and where she was headed. Changing course with another glyph she could ill-afford, Weiss rebounded off the ground again and leapt over the now-three tails as they swirled around in a typhoon of malice.

Two of the three were pinned down by a scythe and pillar of ice respectively, while the third shifted to trip the Paladin moving to subdue it. Either way, it was not attacking Weiss and so she didn't give it another thought.

"Do it!" Qrow screamed from beneath her as he struggled against the thrashing appendage. He winced in pain as the tail made of liquid flame spilled over his blade, tendrils licking the sleeves of his white dress shirt and caramelizing them.

Already the heat was so intense it was like sticking her head into a commercial oven set to 'clean'. Therefore, she wouldn't be able to plant the tag with any kind of finesse. Weiss had already aimed herself at her captain who was completely consumed by the magmatic energy. The problem was that she herself was down to her last dregs of Aura. Any more, and she would be worried about more than a simple sunburn while standing in the radiant heat.

"Go, Weiss!"

This was all she needed to hear as she took a leap of faith. Jumping into the air, she was flung forward by one of her sister's glyphs which had that extra bit of 'oomph' Weiss could never quite achieve.

She told herself that she wasn't going to look, that her ice-blue eyes would dry up and crack in the dessicant heat. But she didn't dare _not_ to. Weiss needed to look into her captain's- her _friend's_ eyes and confirm that she wasn't making a mistake. That Ruby herself was still somewhere underneath all that hatred.

It might have simply been her imagination, but they widened as she approached. That, or the silver color which had been pushed to the edges regained just enough ground to see her friend coming to rescue her.

And then blackness swallowed it all, a fourth tail coming between them and slapping away her feeble efforts. It sent Weiss flying, tumbling and then crashing into the puzzle of bodies on the floor which did little to cushion her impact.

"No…"

Dizzy and dazed thought she was, Weiss propped herself up just in time to see their hopes burn up. The talisman's smoldering ashes floated away like the rose-petals she had come to associate with her optimistic friend.

Ruby herself was dwindling. Personality gone, now even her corpse was being taken over by that all-consuming fire. It blackened her skin at the same time the white in her eyes swallowed up the remaining color.

"No, no, no no…"

Weiss chanted as she crawled her way over the bodies of the fallen. Her words were a prayer to a god she didn't believe in, for a fate they didn't deserve.

"Not you, anyone but you!"

* * *

"Someone… anyone…"

First it had been Naruto, then her sister, then her partner, her friends, her father. She had even entreated the fox which had once been such a familiar comfort, now watching her burn with a violent indifference. And finally, she was left only with the scorched traces of hope as the fiery shadows continued to dance on the walls of her mind.

"Please… help me…"

Not able to shout any longer, yet she was somehow still able to form words. Her throat should have been raw, but that discomfort was nothing compared to the creeping agony which had been torturing her for hours, days, months. Who knew one could die so slowly?

"Naruto…" Looking again to the black abyss above, she might have cried in desperation. Except that the flames seemed to feed on her tears. Except that they had dried up a long time ago. "It hurts… make it stop… please…

"Save me!"

' _ **He can't help you,'**_ Bemoaning this to himself, the beast continued to watch the girl succumb to the pent-up disaffection and rage which had been his duty to hold back for time immemorial. _**'I can't help you, Ruby. You accepted the world's pain when you took his hand. And don't misunderstand, many others will burn before this is over, myself included. Naruto too.'**_

Another scream tore through his stream of thought and Kurama flinched, almost giving in to the urge to clamp his eyes shut to the cruel display. But neither could give into their primal urges. And he would suffer this sight, such was his unenviable duty.

' _ **But he believes in you. He entrusted you with the hatred of the world because he knew you wouldn't succumb to it. This is the price of life, Girl! Yours, his, everyone's! We all suffer, and we will all be dust one day.**_

' _ **But this fate is not what defines you!'**_

As the flames dwindled, Kurama's needlelike pupils widened in the sudden onset of darkness. There was no window to the outside world in that chamber of the mind, yet moonlight glistened on the still water. Gossamer streams of heat shimmered as they rose to the night sky somewhere high above and disappeared. The origin of this pale glow seemed to come from the silver eyes staring right back at him.

"You're... crying."

Blinking in the twilight, two perfectly round droplets rained down and splashed in the halcyon lake below. Ripples propagated from each like twin pulses, two hearts beating simultaneously and each one spurring the other indefinitely.

" **Heh,"** Kurama's steady exhale caressed the peaks of these miniature waves in the universe and he allowed himself the ghost of a smile which spanned the horizon. **"Always thinking of others before yourself… you're just like him, you idiot."**

"Yeah… I've been told that a lot." Now that she wasn't screaming, Ruby could almost hear her partner's voice calling out to her from between the cracks in the walls. Realizing for the first time that she wasn't in pain, the girl glanced down to her hands which bore no visible signs of affliction. "What… happened?"

" **You chose not to feel it,"** Stating this evenly, there was a sigh of relief which could have shifted tides. **"Anger, hatred, pain and the rest. Given all these, you instead chose compassion."**

"Just like that?"

" **Just like that."**

Just like that, she stood up and stared at her reflection in the water which bore witness to the whole event, but retained none of its history.

"You could have ended it at any time?"

" **No,"** Kurama spoke slowly, moved forward even slower. He wanted so desperately to be by her side, to assure this pitiable creature. However, it no longer felt like his place to do so. The time had passed. **"We can give love to oneself and others, but the hate we carry only harms ourselves."**

"Then… that was mine?" Ruby shivered, suddenly frigid without either the scalding heat or the radiant warmth of the Fox. She wanted to run to him and seek comfort in his fur like the security of a favorite blanket. But she could no longer look at him that way. Despite his words, there was now a stain that wouldn't come out.

" **I'm afraid that it comes with the job."** Quirking one side of his black gum upwards shallowly, he didn't want to scare the girl with his toothy smile.

"Job?" Looking up from the pale image of herself, Ruby was almost taken aback as she remembered just how large and fearsome the demon was. "W-what do you mean job?"

" **Why, someone who is going to change the world."**

Not knowing how to take this, Ruby let her gaze fall back down to her hands which seemed so inconsequentially small compared to the vast sea which surrounded them.

"Then, these feelings aren't gone, are they?"

" **No, they will always exist. We carry them with us until the day we die, trying not to pass them on."** With the weight of this statement Kurama let his eyes shut and felt himself fall away. **"But I will disappear, soon enough."**

"What?!" Despite everything that had happened and her permanently altered perception of the Kitsune, Ruby still cared deeply for this personality which she would hesitate to put underneath her father and sister. "But- you said that you're a part of me! This is- this is your Chakra, right?"

" **A fraction of it,"** Resting his massive head on his paws, with great effort he managed to crack open his eyes and offer one last reassuring smile. **"What's left from the portion Naruto used to heal you. I was part of you since that time, holding you together. But I think it's plain to see that you'll be fine on your own."**

A new sound pierced the chamber as Ruby gasped, watching the reclined fox as it aged and withered before her very eyes. Fur once like a wheat field at sunset drooped under a heavy rain which washed the color away. Sharp ridges and peaks weathered to become wrinkled valleys, and the radiant glow from within his eyes decayed with a thousand half-lives all at once.

" **It was nice to meet you though, even if only for a little bit."**

"Wait-!" She reached out to touch him, to keep him from disappearing. But her hand passed right through the flesh which had become translucent. "Where will you go? What will become of the rest of you?

"Will I ever see you again?"

Kurama, the Kyῡbi no Yōkō and king of the Kitsune brightened up, bucked against the universal strings and straightened up with that last bit of pride.

" **Of course! I want to see what you make of this world, little Kit."**

The last she saw were the pearly white teeth of a smile and the words which flowed in between.

" **In case I miss him, tell the Brat I said hi."**

* * *

What would she tell the others?

It seemed funny that she would wonder this when she ought to be more concerned with making it that far. But Weiss already knew that it would be a harder task then rallying herself against this monster for another round. Doing so didn't require thought, just the stalwart obstinance her family was apparently known for.

Thus, she was much more unsure of how to approach Ruby's sister with the fact that their captain had been successful in rescuing the heiress, but they in turn had been unable to save her from whatever ancient evil possessed her. Then again, they'd been through a lot of craziness together. Maybe they'd understand.

Who was she kidding? There was no comprehension necessary for life to kick you in the rear. It did so regardless of rank or awareness.

Maybe she should have been more aware, but it had become such a chore to keep her eyes open.

"Um, Weiss?"

The last twelve hours vanishing in an instant, the girl jolted to her feet like that one time Klein accidentally served her Winter's coffee instead of her usual black tea.

"Ruby!" She gushed. "Ruby!" She balked. "Ruby?"

She peered cautiously at the girl who had a chagrinned smile and was rubbing her arm, either in pain or embarrassment. Given that until a little while ago she had been the one kicking their assess, it was likely the latter. But Weiss scanned her up and down just to be sure. For that reason, and to make sure that she was not an artificial replacement or channeling for an ancient demon that made the Grimm look like house-pets.

"Are you… _you_?"

"I… think so?" Switching her hand to her mussed-up hair, the girl proceeded to disorganize it even more as she rearranged her thoughts. "I mean, it doesn't feel like I was ever _not_ me. But then, I don't really remember how I got here… or what happened after that." Scanning her suspicious surroundings, she had a few ideas but didn't want to be the first to voice them. "I do feel really tired. My blood-sugar must be low. I could really use a cookie… or dozen."

"It's you, you dolt." With exhausted relief, a smile and a shake of the head, Weiss felt that her duty was done, and her borrowed energy leave her.

"If you say so. I still feel kind of strange…"

Before Weiss could act on her own fatigue, in front of her Ruby's again-silver eyes rolled up in her head and she pitched forward. She was unconscious before even hitting the ground- not that Weiss would let her, catching her partner awkwardly and struggling not to drop her.

"Hey! You- you idiot!"

"Friend Ruby!"

Mercifully, she didn't have to hold this uncomfortable position for long as Penny quickly skipped over the piles of bodies to them. In her wake was an equally wrung-out Qrow and Winter who had been observing the interaction from a safe distance. The latter was supporting the former- actually, more like dragging him with one hand clamped firmly around his collar.

"Penny!" Remembering the girl who was somehow even more quirky that her leader, Weiss initially wanted to question why she was here. Priorities took over instead. "Can you give me a hand with this lug?"

"Is she… back to normal?" Winter asked while the girl's uncle merely observed half-lidded.

"No," Weiss huffed, finding the back of a relatively clean Atlesian Knight and plopping down on it. "Normal doesn't describe her. But she's Ruby."

"Yeah, that sounds about right." Straightening up, Qrow demonstrated that he could have done so at any time. Carelessly brushing off his clothes only served to rub this in- along with the accumulated blood and dirt into his ruined shirt.

On top of everything else that happened that day including the warehouse full of White Fang and their own mechanized forces, this might have been the proverbial straw to break the camel's back. Instead, Winter chose to relish in their accomplishment and not strangle the insufferable man.

"Then I think we can declare this a victory."

His little game abruptly stopped, Qrow also felt his body freeze in horror. His muscles locked and his scruffy jaw went rigid, dispelling the poorly-hidden smirk.

"Uh, guys. Wasn't there like, a bad-guy here a minute ago?"

* * *

"If at first you don't succeed, try again, huh?"

The irony of this statement was not lost on the perfectionist shinobi as he leered down at the latest incarnation of civilization, life laid out in neat little grids. But from the vantage afforded to him by the rugged mountains northwest of Atlas, he was only reassured in his convictions.

"Because this world is so dependent on machines and automation, they will drop their guard again. All I need to do is wait and bide my time. Perhaps secure myself a new body, one not so flimsy and… recognizable. Although…"

Looking uphill from his current incline, the spattering of pine trees only became more dense the further up he looked. Everything - even the mountains themselves- would be reduced to dust one day. It would all become like the sandy dunes of his homeland, and this incident but a grain among them. Though the rugged terrain was not his scene, per se, there was still something appealing in the longevity, the slow-moving evolution which kept the flora essentially unchanged since the dawn of time.

"Then again, perhaps I ought to… just disappear, slip away to become a tree myself and not bother with this pernicious society. They will destroy themselves in their own given time, of that there is no doubt. History, life, repeat themselves. Although, I will admit that I had not expected anyone to be capable of replicating our Fῡinjutsu. That was my fault, and is something to be prepared for, next time."

"Personally, I find that the only thing you can expect from life _is_ the unexpected."

This statement was certainly true unto itself, and he whipped around to confront it. Drawing his only weapon, he leveled the stolen ōdachi at the meek-looking man perched like a gargoyle on a xenolith.

"Then, am I to believe that you did not intentionally hide yourself here, expecting to find me?"

Appearing even less intimidating than the student huntresses, he could in fact, almost believe that this meeting had been a coincidence. It wouldn't be out of place to assume that this was some mountain-man with the way his dirty and second-hand clothing billowed voluminously off his scrawny frame. It somehow made him appear even smaller than he was, sitting cross-legged on that enormous boulder. Everything about him was less than ordinary. Except, however, for the brilliant yellow notebook which the shinobi had somehow overlooked. And the intense myopathy in which the man scribbled away silently in it.

"Oh, it was always a possibility." Not looking up from his scribing, neither did the man make any overt movements to defend himself from the sword/gun combo brandished in his direction. Either blindly unaware of the danger, or else fully prepared to accept death. "- _But God is not a machine_."

"Then, you know who I am?" The criminal was not hesitant to eliminate potential witnesses. Though if this man was as familiar with the back-country as he appeared, he might prove a useful guide. The local topography was rife with both Grimm and Atlas outposts.

"Of course. You are Sasori of the Red Sands." All the joints in the shinobi locked as he heard the title which he never expected to hear in this lifetime. Surprisingly, the man paused too and blinked behind his coke-bottle glasses before flipping back pages in his bright-yellow notebook. "-Or was it 'of the Bloody Sands'? The translation was a little vague and parts of my memory are… missing."

"Oh no, your translation is perfectly satisfactory." Sasori said with a smirk that decried more confidence than was there.

"Ah, good, because I think I left those notes at… with someone else." There was a brief pause as he accessed a memory that was not within those pages before he turned back to his marked place and continued as if nothing had happened. Ever.

"-Although, I am curious as to how you came about that name." Wishing that he had installed more defensive systems into his borrowed body, nonetheless Sasori fathomed that he could easily cut the man down before he grew to regret that oversight. His S-Rank status had no expiration date. "Not many are alive who know me by that moniker."

"Well, they say that history is written by the victors. But I'm not sure if I believe that anymore." Continuing to write furiously whilst saying this, he seemed even more impassioned to finish whatever it was now than before. "History happens whether or not someone is there to observe it. Life moves on regardless if we are dead, or even merely asleep. And then there are those who are asleep their whole lives, unconscious to their actions and the consequences."

"Ha," Lowering his blade a modicum, Sasori hardly felt threatened by a man who already spoke as if he were already dead. "I would say that you are preaching to the choir- but I cannot claim that much investment. No, neither the wooden idol nor the Church stones need such proselytizing. So if you are not here to smite me, then I will take my leave."

"And what will you do then?" Stopping, the pen awaited his answer.

"Does it matter?"

In the absence of the frantic scratching the slope fell silent. Birds of Spring had already gone to bed as the sun bled crimson on those snow-covered hills. There was a crack as a snow owl left its perch and a yellow moleskin notebook snapped shut.

"No," Retracting his dangling leg, with a good bit of effort the man stood and balanced on his perch. "I guess not."

He dared turn his back to the façade of the White Fang's most notorious leader and the spirit of an S-Rank killer, took a couple steps towards the slope and hopped off his rock. There was a creak of bone and metal as his artificial leg settled into the uneven ground and what remained of the limb settled into the prosthetic.

But most of that was drowned out by the explosion.

Bombs buried hours ago beneath the snow and hidden by the refreeze detonated simultaneously. Unlike the explosives used for mining, these were fast and violent, ripping through the air and whatever else stood in their way.

The tremors they caused nearly knocked the man off his feet, both metal and flesh. And the angry flames lashed their claws around the boulder trying to get at him, but only managed to caress the fringes of his moth-eaten knitted cap whose color had already been blackened.

"Hm,"

Grunting, he picked his way around the stone shelter and gazed down at what had become of the small landing. Snow cleared away, the rocks lining the old goat path all took on an obsidian sheen. And in their middle were the remnants of something charred and mangled, recognizable as neither man nor machine but overlooked by a twisted piece of metal that stood determined.

"Never stood a chance, did you?" The heavy sigh he heaved carried with it the rancid smell of sulfur and the sweet scent of charred flesh, making him sneeze.

*Achoo!* *Sniff,*

"Well, I guess that's how the story's supposed to go though, isn't it? Guys like you and me, we don't make it out alive."

Unable to bear the somber scene any longer, he shifted to look at the curtain of light slowly falling over the crystalline city of Atlas. At last the northern sun was setting, and in doing so it illuminated the main characters somewhere far down below.

Eventually he turned his back on this too, just as the scene faded to black. He would have liked to see more, to know that everything turned out alright in the end. But he was just too far away.

"I guess, we'll just have to write in our own happy ending, huh?"

Cresting the south-dipping ridge, Bruno blinked as he was reacquainted with the sunlight that would shine on this slope at least a few more hours. Finding a cozy-looking rock, he nestled in and cracked open his notebook which by this point was looking a little worse for the wear.

He flipped past pages crammed with labels and numbers, hasty sketches of a glacial cirque, and a whole page dedicated to a meticulous copy of an ancient talisman with its swirling, esoteric script. After that, several amorous poems he had crossed out but couldn't bear to throw away.

At last he arrived upon a section devoted purely to words, filling the sheets top to bottom and spilling into every margin. Picking it up where he left off, the pen found its way to the blank space and started writing.

"…He returned to her, breathless and more scared than he'd been since the day he died. During his time away, he realized that he didn't care about the weight of the world threatening to crush them. He didn't care about the way things looked, the way things should, and the way they ought to be. He realized that he loved her, and that they were allowed to share this selfish desire.

"Taking her into his arms, she forgave him his foolishness with the condition that he forgive her own. Both knew that they would be making many more such errors in their lives to come and so forgave themselves at the same time. It wasn't a perfect love they shared, and there would surely be many reminders of this along the way. But then again, it wasn't a perfect story.

"And this didn't matter. In the grand scheme, these flaws were so small as to hardly be noticeable. They themselves were two grains of dust on the greater wind of the universe, blowing any which way it pleased and unknowable to mere mortals.

"And therefore, as far as we know, they lived happily ever after."

*Sniff*

* * *

 **Over? For now. If you know me at all, I like to leave my endings open-ended, and that goes some way to explaining the abrupt ending. In truth, I had planned it this way for some time. Perhaps I could have added a bit more padding before and even after. But considering this story wasn't very popular, I didn't see much necessity. I take full responsibility for both of these observations.  
**

 **If you made it this far, I hope that you at least somewhat enjoyed the journey. Perhaps the winds will have us meet again someday.**

 **Until then, from one speck of dust to another, thanks for joining me.**


End file.
